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Book ^Bi^-5 — 



)890 




THE PRINCESS VICTORIA IN 1830 
(From the Picture by Richard Westall, R.A., at Windsor Castle.) 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



BY 



WALTER BESANT 



AUTHOR OF 'ALL SORTS AND CONDITIONS OF MEN' ETC. 




PRO FUSEL V ILL USTRA TED 



NEW YORK 
HARPER & BROTHERS, FRANKLIN SQUARE 



c IVJ- 



'DA 533 






By WALTER BE S ANT. 



ALL IN A GARDEN FAIR. 4to, Pa- 
per, 20 cents. 

DOROTHY FORSTER. 4to, Paper, 20 
ceil IS. 

FIFTY YEARS AGO. 8vo, Cloth. 
(Just Published.) 

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KATHERINE REGINA. 4to, Paper, 
IS cents. 

LIFE OP COLIGNY. 32mo, Paper, 25 
cents. 



SELF OR BEARER. 4to, Paper, 15 cts. 
THE WORLD WENT VERY WELL 

THEN. Illustrated. 4to, Paper, 25 

cents. 

THE CHILDREN OF GIBEON. 4to, 
Paper, 20 cents. 

THE HOLY ROSE. 4to, Paper, 20 cents. 

TO CALL HER MINE. Illustrated. 

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UNCLE JACK AND OTHER STORIES. 

12nio, Paper, 25 cents. 



By WALTER BESANT AND JAMES RICE. 



ALL SORTS AND CONDITIONS OF 
MEN. 4t,o, Paper, 20 cents. 

BY C ELI A'S ARBOR. Illustrated. Svo, 

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SHEPHERDS ALL AND MAIDENS 

FAIR. 32mo, Paper, 25 cents. 

"SO THEY' WERE MARRIED." Il- 
lustrated. 4to, Paper, 20 cents. 

SWEET NELLY, MY HEART'S DE- 
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S^~ Any of the above works will be sent by mail, postage prepaid, to any part of 
the United States or Canada, on receipt of the price. 



PREFACE. 

It has been my desire in the following pages to present 
a picture of society in this country as it was when the 
Queen ascended the throne. The book is an enlarge- 
ment of a paper originally contributed to ' The Graphic' 
I have written several additional chapters, and have 
revised all the rest. The chapter on Law and Justice 
has been written for this volume by ray friend Mr. W. 
Morris Colles, of the Inner Temple. I beg to record 
my best thanks to that gentleman for his important 
contribution. 

I have not seen in any of the literature called forth 
by the happy event of last year any books or papers 
which cover the exact ground of this compilation. 
There are histories of progress and advancement ; 
there are contrasts ; but there has not been offered any- 
where, to my knowledge, a picture of life, manners, and 
society as they were fifty years ago. 

When the editor of ' The Graphic ' proposed that I 
should write a paper on this subject, I readily con- 
sented, thinking it would be a light and easy task, and 
one which could be accomplished in two or three 
weeks. Light and easy it certainly was in a sense, 



V, FIFTY YEARS AGO 

because it was very pleasant work, and the books to be 
consulted are easily accessible ; but then there are so 
many : the investigation of a single point sometimes 
carried one through half-a-dozen volumes. The two or 
three weeks became two or three months. 

At the very outset of the work I was startled to 
find how great a revolution has taken place in our 
opinions and ways of thinking, how much greater than 
is at first understood. For instance, America was, fifty 
years ago, practically unknown to the bulk of our 
people ; American ideas had little or no influence upon 
us ; our people had no touch with the United States ; 
if they spoke of a Eepublic, they still meant the first 
French Eepublic, the only Eepublic they knew, with 
death to kings and tyrants ; while the recollection of the 
guillotine still preserved cautious and orderly people 
from Eepubhcan ideas. 

Who now, however, connects a Eepublic with a 
Eeign of Terror and the guillotine ? The American 
Eepublic, in fact, has taken the place of the French. 
Again, though the Eeform Bill had been, in 1837, 
passed already five years, its effects were as yet only 
beginning to be felt ; we were still, politically, in the 
eighteenth century. So in the Church, in the Law, in 
the Services, in Society, we were governed by the ideas 
of the eighteenth century. 



PREFACE vii 

The nineteenth century actually began with steam 
communication by sea; with steam machinery; with 
railways; with telegraphs; with the development of 
the colonies ; with the admission of the people to the 
government of the country; with the opening of the 
Universities ; with the spread of science ; with the 
revival of the democratic spirit. It did not really 
begin, in fact, till about fifty years ago. When and 
how will it end ? By what order, by what ideas, will 
it be followed ? 

In compiling even such a modest work as the pre- 
sent, one is constantly attended by a haunting dread ol 
having forgotten something necessary to complete the 
picture. I have been adding little things ever since I 
began to put these scenes together. At this, the very 
last moment, the Spirit of Memory whispers in my ear, 
* Did you remember to speak of the high fireplaces, the 
open chimneys — up which half the heat mounted — 
the broad hobs, and the high fenders, with the fronts 
pierced, in front of which people's feet were always cold? 
Did you remember to note that the pin of the period 
had its head composed of a separate piece of wire rolled 
round ; that steel pens were either as yet unknown, or 
were precious and costly things ; that the quill was 
always wanting a fresh nib ; that the wax-match did 
not exist ; that in the country they still used the old- 



viii FIFTY YEARS AGO 

fashioned brimstone match ; that the night-light of the 
period was a rush candle stuck in a round tin cyhnder 
full of holes ; and that all the ladies' dress had hooks 
and eyes behind ? ' 

L do not think that I have mentioned any of these 
points ; and yet, how much food for reflection is 
afforded by every one ! Eeader, you may perhaps find 
my pictures imperfect, but you can fill in any one 
sketch from your own superior knowledge. Meantime, 
remember this. As nearly as possible, fifty years ago, 
the eighteenth century passed away. It died slowly ; 
its end was hardly marked. 

King William the Fourth is dead. Alas ! how many 
things were dying with that good old king ! The steam- 
whistle was already heard across the fields : already in 
mid-ocean the great steamers were crossing against wind 
and tide : already the nations were slowly beginning 
to know each other : Privilege, Patronage, and the 
Power of Rank were beginning already to tremble, and 
were afraid : already the working man was heard de- 
manding his vote : the nineteenth century had begun. 
We who have lived in it ; we who are full of its ideas ; 
we who are all swept along upon the full stream of it — 
we know not, we cannot see, whither it is carrying us. 

W. B. 



CONTENTS. 



OHAPTKB PAO« 

I. Great Britain, Ireland, and the Colonies ... 1 

II. The Year 1837 .18 

III. London in 1837 30 

IV. In the Street 45 

V. With the People 67 

VI. With the Middle-Class . . . ' . . . . 85 

VII. In Society 110 

VIII. At the Play and the Show 125 

IX. In the House 137 

X. At School and University 154 

XI. The Tavern 160 

XII. In Club- and Card-land 175 

XIII. With the Wits 183 

XIV. Journals and Journalists 209 

XV. The Sportsman 214 

XVI. In Factory and Mine 224 

XVII. With the Men of Science 233 

XVIII. Law and Justice 237 

XIX. Conclusion • » 258 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 



PLATES. 

The Princess Victoria in 1830. From the Picture hy 

Elchard Westall, E.A., at Windsor Castle . . . Frontispiece 

Windsor Castle Vignette 

Queen Victoria in 1839. From a Drawing Inj R. J. pagk 

Lane,A.R.A To face 1 

Thomas Carlyle. From the Fraser Gallery . . . . „ 10 

The Queen's First Council — Kensington Palace, June 
20, 1837. From the Picture Inj Sir David Wilkie, P.A., 
at Windsor Castle ......... 18 

A Show of Twelfth - Cakes. From CruihhanFs ^ Comic 

Almanack'' . . „ 20 

Greenwich Park. From CruiTcshanl-'s ^ Comic Almanack'' ,, 32 

The Chimney- Sweeps' Annual Holiday. Fi-om Cruik- 

' shank^s'' Comic Almanack'' ........ 24 

Beating the Bounds. From Cruikshaiik's ' Comic 

Almanack'' ........... 26 

Bartholomew Fair. From CruikshanFs ^Co77iic Almanack' „ 28 

Vauxhall Gardens. From Cruiksha7ik''s ^ Comic Almanack'' „ 30 

In Fleet Street. Proclaiming the Queen. From Cruik- 

shanFs ^ Comic Almanack'' . ....... 56 

Leigh Hunt. From the Fraser Gallery . . . . „ 64 

John Galt. From the Fraser Gallery „ 8(5 

The Queen receiving the Sacrament after her Coro- 
nation. Westminster Abbey, June 28, 18B8. From 
the Picture hy C. B. Leslie.^ P.A., at Windsor Castle . . „ 94 

Theodore Hook. From the Fraser Gallery . . . . „ 100 ' 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



The Countess of Blessington. From the Fraser Gallery 

Count d'Orsay. From the Fraser Gallery 

Sydney Smith. From the Fraser Gallery 

John Baldwin Buckstone. From the Fraser Gallery 

Thomas Noon Talfourd. From the Fraser Gallery . 

Mary Russell Mitford. From the Fraser Gallery 

Sir Walter Scott. From the Fraser Gallery . 

Lord Lyndhurst. From the Fraser Gallery . 

William Cobbett. Froin the Fraser Gallery 

Lord John Russell. From the Fraser Gallery 

Edward Lytton Bulwer. From the Fraser Gallery . 

Benjamin D'Israeli. From the Fraser Gallery 

Thomas Campbell. From the Fraser Gallery 

Samuel Taylor Coleridge. From the Fraser Gallery 

William Wordsworth. From the Fraser Gallery 

Rev. William Lisle Bowles. From the Fraser Gallery 

Pierre-Jean de Beranger. From the Fraser Gallery . 

James Hogg. From the Fraser Gallery 

Regina's Maids op Honour. From the Fraser Gallery 

IL\rriet Martineau. From the Fraser Gallery . 

William Harrison Ainsworth. From the Fraser Gallery 

The Fraserians. From the Fraser Gallery 

John Gibson Lockhart. From the Fraser Gallery 

Samuel Rogers. Fi-om the Fraser Gallery . 

Thomas Moore. Fro^n the Fraser Gallery 

Lord Brougham and Vaux. Fro7n the Fraser Gallery 

Washington Irving. Fro77i the Fraser Gallery 

John Wilson Croker. From the Fraser Gallery 

Cockney Sportsmen. From Cruilcshanlc's ' Comic A ImanacTc 

Return from the Races. From Cruilcshanlc's '■Comic 

AlmanacJc'' . 

Sir John C. Hobhouse. Fro?n the Fraser Gallery 

A Point of Law. Fro?7i Cruilshanlc's '■Comic Almanach' 

Michael Faraday. From the Fraser Gallery 



PAGE 


1. To face 110 


112 


116 


126 


128 


130 


132' 


138 


140 


144 


148 


150 


• „ 176 


182 


184 


186 


188 


190 


193 


194' 


J ,. 196 


198 


200 


202 


204 


206 


208 


210 


' „ 218 


c 

220 


226 


. „ 238 


258 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS xiii 



WOODCUTS IN THE TEXT. 

PAGM 

Arrival of the Coronation Number of ' The Sun ' , . .2 

Lifeguard, 1837 . . 4 

General Postman 6 

Napoleon at Longwood. From a Draiving made in 1820 . . 12 
London Street Characters, 1837. From a Drawing hy John 

Leech 14 

5 Great Cheyne Row. The House in which Carlyle lived from 

1834 to his Death in 1881 16 

The Duchess of Kent, with the Princess Victoria at the Age 

OF Two. From the Picture hy Sir W. Beechey, B.A., at Windsor 

Castle 17 

William IV. From a Drawing by HB 18 

Peeler 20 

The Spaniards Tavern, Hampstead 22 

Sir Egbert Peel 24 

A Parish Beadle. From a Draiving hy George CruiJcshanh in 

' London Characters ' . . . . . . . . . 26 

Evening in Smithfield. From a Drawing made in 1858, at the 

Gateway leading into Cloth Fair, the Place of Proclamation of 

Bartholomew Fair ......... 28 

Fireman 31 

Hackney Coachman. From a Drawing hy George CruikshanTc in 

' London Characters ' 34 

The First London Exchange 34 

The Second London Exchange 35 

The Present Royal Exchange — Third London Exchange . . 35 
Charing Cross in the Present Day. From a Drawing hy Frank 

Murray 37 

Temple Bar 38 

The Royal Courts of Justice 39 

Lyons Inn in 1804, From an Engraving in Herbert's ' History of 

the Inns of Court ' 41 

Kennington Gate — Derby Day 42 



xiv FIFTY YEARS AGO 

PAOB 

The Old Roman Bath in the Strand 43 

London Street Characters, 1827. From a Drawing hij John 

Leech 46 

The King's Mews in 1750. From a Print by I. Maurer . . . 47 
Barrack and Old Houses on the Site of Trafalgar ISquare. 

From a Drawing made by F. W. FairlioU in 182G . . .48 
The Last Cabriolet-Driver. From a Drawing by George Cruik- 

shanh in ' Sketches by Boz ' 49 

A Greenwich Pensioner, From a Drawing by George Cruikshank 

in ' London Characters ' 52 

An Omnibus Upset. From Cruikshank's ' Comic Almanack ' . . 53 

Exeter Change 54 

The Parish Engine. From a Draiuing by George Cruikshank in 

' Sketches by Boz ' 56 

Crockford's Fish Shop.. From a Draiving by F.W. Fairholt . 57 

Thomas Chatterton 60 

Third Regiment of Buffs 63 

Douglas Jerrold. From the Bust by E. H. Bailey, 11. A. ... 64 
John Forstek. From a Photograph by Elliott d Fry . . . 6") 

Charles Dickens 66 

The Darby Day. From Cruikshank' s ^ Comic Almanack' . . 76 

Newgate — Entrance in the Old Bailey 77 

In the Queen's Bench . 79 

George Eliot. From a Drawing in ' The Graphic ' . 86 

La Pastourelle 89 

Fashions fob August 1836 98 

Fashions for March 1837 98 

Watchman. From a Draiving by George Cruikshank in ' London 

Characters ' 101 

A Scene on Blackheath. From a Drawing by ' Phiz ' in Grant's 

' Sketches in London ' 105 

Maid-Servant. From a Drawing by George Cruikshank in ' London 

Characters ' 107 

Officer of the Dragoon Guards Ill 

A Sketch in the Park — The Duke of Wellington and Mrs. 

Arbuthnot , 115 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS xv 

PAOB 
LiNKMAN • . . 117 

William Makepeace Thackeray 123 

LiSTON as ' Paul Pry.' From a Drawing hy George Cruikshanh . 128 

Charles Reade 130 

T. P. Cooke in ' Black-eyed Susan ' . . ... 132 

Vauxhall Gardens 133 

The ' New ' Houses of Parliament, from the Riveu . . . 138 

Lord Melbourne 140 

Thomas Babington Macaulay 141 

Lord Palmerston 142 

BuRDETT, Hume, and O'Connell. From a Drawing by HB. . 143 

Daniel O'Connell 14G 

O'Connell taking the Oaths in the House. From a Drawing by 

' Phiz ' in ' Sketclies in London ' ...... 147 

Edmund Kean as Richard the Third 161 

Old Entrance to the Cock, Fleet Street 1G3 

The Old Tabard Inn, High Street, Southwark . . . . 173 
Sign of the Swan with Two Necks, Carter Lane , . . 174 

Sign of the Bolt-in-Tun, Fleet Street 174 

Oxford and Cambridge Club, Pall Mall 17G 

United University Club, Pall Mall 177 

Crockford's, St. James's Street 179 

Charles Knight. From a Photograph by Hughes d Mullins . 184 

Robert Southey 185 

Thomas Moore 186 

' Vathek ' Beckford. From a Medallion 187 

Walter Savage Landor. From, a Photograph by H. Wathins . 188 

Ralph Waldo Emerson 189 

Lord Byron 190 

Sir Walter Scott 191 

A Fashionable Beauty of 1837. By A. E. Chalon, Ii.A. . . 193 

Lord Tennyson as a Young Man. From the Picture by Sir T. 

Lawrence, B.A 196 

Matthew Arnold 200 

Charles Darwin 201 



xvi FIFTY YEARS AGO 

PAoa 
Holland House 203 

Letting Cuildeen down a Coal-Mine. From a Plate in ' The 

Westminster Review ' 225 

Children Working in a Coal-Mine. From a Plate in ' The West- 

minster Review ' 229 

London Street Characters, 1837. From a Drawing by John 

Leech 231 

Marshalsea — The Courtyard. From a Drawing by C. A. Van- 

derhoof 239 






QUEEN VICTORIA IN 1839. 
(From.u Drawing by R. J. Laxe, A.R.A.) 



FIFTY YEARS AGO. 

CHAPTER I. 

GREAT BRITAIN, IRELAND, AND THE COLONIES. 

I PROPOSE to set before my readers a picture of the 
country as it was when Queen Victoria (God save the 
Queen !) ascended the throne, now fifty years ago and 
more. It will be a picture of a time so utterly passed 
away and vanished that a young man can hardly under- 
stand it. I, who am no longer, unhappily, quite so 
young as some, and whose babyhood heard the cannon 
of the Coronation, can partly understand this time, 
because in many respects, and especially in the man- 
ners of the middle class, customs and habits which 
went out of fashion in London lingered in the country 
towns, and formed part of my own early experiences. 

In the year 1837 — I shall repeat this remark several 
times, because I wish to impress the fact upon every- 
body — we were still, to all intents and purposes, in the 
eighteenth century. As yet the country was untouched 



2 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

by that American influence which is now filUng all 
peoples with new ideas. Eank was still held in the 
ancient reverence; religion was still that of the 
eighteenth-century Church ; the rights of labour were 
not yet recognised ; there were no trades' unions ; there 
were no railways to speak of; nobody travelled except 




ARRIVAL OF THE CORONATION NUMBER OF ' THE SUN ' ONE PAPER, AND ONE MAN 

WHO CAN READ IT IN THE TOWN 



the rich ; their own country was unknown to the 
people ; the majority of country people could not read 
or write ; the good old discipline of Father Stick and 
his children, Cat-o'-Nine-Tails, Eope's-end, Strap, Birch, 
Ferule, and Cane, was wholesomely maintained ; land- 
lords, manufacturers, and employers of all kinds did 



GREAT BRITAIN, IRELAND, THE COLONIES 3 

what they pleased with their own; and the Blue Ribbon 
was unheard of. There were still some fiery spirits in 
whose breasts linj^ered the ideas of the French Revolu- 
tion, and the Chartists were already beginning to run 
their course. Beneath the surface there was discon- 
tent, which sometimes bubbled up. But freedom of 
speech was limited, and if the Sovereign People had 
then ventured to hold a meeting in Trafalgar Square, 
that meeting would have been dispersed in a very swift 
and surprising manner. The Eeform Act had been 
passed, it is true, but as yet had produced little efiect. 
Elections were carried by open bribery ; the Civil 
Service was full of great men's nominees ; the Church 
was devoured by pluralists ; there were no competitive 
examinations ; the perpetual pensions were many and 
fat ; and for the younger sons and their progeny the 
State was provided with any number of sinecures. 
How men contrived to live and to be cheerful in this 
state of things one knows not. But really, I think it 
made very little apparent difference to their happiness 
that this country was crammed full of abuses, and that 
the Ship of State, to outsiders, seemed as if she were 
about to capsize and founder. 

This is to be a short chapter of figures. Figures 
mean very little unless they can be used for purposes 
of comparison. When, for instance, one reads that in 
the Census of 1831 the population of Great Britain 
was 16,539,318, the fact has little significance except 
when compared with the Census of 1881, which shows 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



tliat the population of the country had mcreased in 
fifty years from sixteen milhons to twenty-four milUons. 
And, again, one knows not whether to rejoice or to 
weep over this fact until it has been ascertained how 
the condition of these millions has changed for better 
or for worse, and whether the outlook for the future, 
if, in the next fifty years, twenty-four become thirty- 
six, is hopeful or no. Next, when one reads that the 

population of Ireland was then 
seven millions and three-quar- 
ters, and is now less than fi.ve 
millions, and, further, that one 
Irishman in three was always 
next door to starving, and that 
the relative importance of Ire- 
land to Great Britain was then 
as one to two, and is now as 
one to five, one naturally con- 
gratulates Ireland on getting 
more elbow-room and Great 
Britain on the relative decrease 
in Irish power to do the larger island an injury. 

The Army and Navy together in 1831 contained no 
more than 277,017 men, or half their present number. 
But then the proportion of the English military strength 
to the French was much nearer one of equality. The 
relief of the poor in 1831 absorbed 6,875,552/., but 
this sum in 1844 had dropped to 4,976,090/., the 
saving of two millions being due to the new Poor Law. 




LIFEGTJAKD, 1837 



GREAT BRITAIN, IRELAND, THE COLONIES 5 

The stream of emigration had hardly yet begun to flow. 
Witness the following; ficrures : 

The number of emigrants in 1820 was 18,984 

1825 8,860 

„ „ 1832 103,311 

„ „ 1837 72,034 

It was not until 1841 that the great flow of emi- 
grants began in the direction of New Zealand and Aus- 
tralia. The emigrants of 1832 chiefly went to Canada, 
and as yet the United States were practically unaflected 
by the rush from the old countries. 

The population of the great towns has for the most 
part doubled itself in the last fifty years. London had 
then a million and a half; Liverpool, 200,000; Man- 
chester, 250,000 ; Glasgow, 250,000 ; Birmingham, 
150,000 ; Leeds, 140,000 ; and Bristol, 120,000. 

Penal settlements were still flourishing. Between 
1825 and 1840, when they were suppressed, 48,712 
convicts were sent out to Sydney. As regards travel- 
ling, the fastest rate along the high roads was ten miles 
an hour. There were 54 four-horse mail coaches in 
England, and 49 two-horse mails. In Ireland there 
were 30 four-horse coaches, and 10 in Scotland. There 
were 3,026 stage coaches in the country, of which 
1,507 started from London. 

There were already 668 British steamers afloat, 
though the penny steamboat did not as yet ply upon 
the river. Heavy goods travelled by the canals and 
navi<Table rivers, of which there were 4,000 in Great 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



Britain; the hackney coach, with its pair of horses, 
lumbered slowly along the street; the cabriolet was 
the light vehicle for rapid conveyance, but it was not 
popular ; the omnibus had only recently been intro- 
duced by Mr. Shillibeer ; and there were no hansom 
cabs. There was a Twopenny Post in London, but no 

Penny Post as yet. There 
was no Book Post, no 
Parcel Post, no London 
Parcels Deli very Company . 
If you wanted to send a 
parcel to anywhere in 
the country, you confided 
it to the guard of the 
coach ; if to a town ad- 
dress, there were street 
messengers and the 'cads' 
about the stage-coach 
stations ; there were no telegraphs, no telephones, no 
commissionaires. 

Fifty years ago the great railways were all begun, 
but not one of them was completed. A map published 
in the Athenoeum of January 23, 1836, shows the state 
of the railways at that date. The line between Liver- 
pool and Manchester was opened in September, 1830. 
In 1836 it was carrying 450,000 passengers in the year, 
and paying a dividend of 9 per cent. The line between 
Carlisle and Newcastle was very nearly completed ; that 
between Leeds and Selby was opened in 1834 ; there 




GENEEAL POSTMAN 



GREAT BRITAIN, IRELAND, THE COLONIES 7 

were many short lines in the coal and mining districts, 
and little bits of the great lines were already completed. 
The London and Greenwich line was begun in 1834 and 
opened in 1837. There were in progress the London 
and Birmingham, the Birmingham, Stafford, and War- 
rington, the Great Western as far as Bath and Bristol, 
and the London and Southampton passing through 
Basingstoke. It is amazing to think that Portsmouth, 
the chief naval port and place of embarkation for 
troops, was left out altogether. There were also a 
great many lines projected, which afterwards settled 
down into the present great Trunk lines. As they were 
projected in 1836, instead of Great Northern, Forth- 
Western, and Great Eastern, we should have had one 
line passing through Saffron Walden, Cambridge, 
Peterborough, Lincoln, York, Appleby, and Carlisle, 
with another from London to Colchester, Ipswich, 
Norwich, and Yarmouth ; there was also a projected 
continuation of the G.W.E,. line from Bristol to Exeter, 
and three or four projected lines to Brighton and Dover. 
The writer of the article on the subject in the Athenceum 
of that date (January 23, 1836) considers that when 
these lines are completed, letters and passengers will 
be conveyed from London to Liverpool in ten hours. 
* Little attention,' he says, ' has yet been given to calcu- 
late the effects which must result from the establishment 
throughout the kingdom of great lines of intercourse 
traversed at a speed of twenty miles an hour.' Unfor- 
tunately he had no confidence in himself as a prophet, 



8 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

or we might have had some curious and interesting 
forecasts. 

As regards the extent of the British Empire, there 
has been a very httle contraction and an enormous 
extension. We have given up the Ionian Islands to 
gratify the sentiment of Mr. Gladstone, and we have 
acquired Cyprus, which may perhaps prove of use. 
We have taken possession of Aden, at the mouth of 
the Eed Sea. In Hindostan, which in 1837 was still 
partially ruled by a number of native princes, the flag 
of Great Britain now reigns supreme ; the whole of 
Burma is now British Burma ; the little island of Hong 
Kong, which hardly appears in Arrowsmith's Atlas of 
1840, is now a stronghold of the British Empire. 
Borneo, then wholly unknown, now belongs partially 
to us ; New Guinea is partly ours ; Fiji is ours. For 
the greatest change of all, however, we must look at the 
maps of Australia and New Zealand. In the former 
even the coast had not been completely surveyed ; Mel- 
bourne was as yet but a little unimportant township. 
Between Melbourne and Botany Bay there was not a 
single village, settlement, or plantation It was not 
until the year 1851, only thirty-six years ago, that Port 
Phillip was separated from New South Wales, and 
created an independent colony under the name of 
Victoria ; and for a few years it was a very rowdy and 
noisy colony indeed. 

In New South Wales, the population of which 
was about 150,000, convicts were still sent out. In 



GREAT BRITAIN, IRELAND, THE COLONIES 9 

the year 1840, when the transportation ceased, 21,000 
convicts were assigned to private service. There were 
in Sydney many men, ex-convicts, who had raised them- 
selves to wealth ; society was divided by a hard line, 
not to be crossed in that generation by those on the 
one side whose antecedents were* honourable and those 
on the other who had ' served their time.' Tasmania 
was also still a penal colony, and, apparently, a place 
where the convicts did not do so well as in New South 
Wales. 

Queensland as a separate colony was not yet in exist- 
ence, though Brisbane had been begun ; tropical Aus- 
tralia was wholly unsettled ; Western Australia was, 
what it still is, a poor and thinly settled country. 

The map of New Zealand — it was not important 
enough to have a map all to itself — shows the coast-line 
imperfectly surveyed, and not a single town or English 
settlement upon it ! Fifty years ago that great colony 
was not yet even founded. The first serious settlement 
was made in 1839, when a patch of land at Port 
Nicholson, in Cook Strait, was bought from the natives 
for the first party of settlers sent out by the recently 
established New Zealand Company. 

In North America the whole of the North-West 
Territory, including Manitoba, Muskoka, British Co- 
lumbia, and Vancouver's Island, was left to Indians, 
trappers, buffaloes, bears, and rattlesnakes. South 
Africa shows the Cape Colony and nothing else. Natal, 
Orange Free State, the Transvaal, Bechuanaland, Griqua- 



lo FIFTY YEARS AGO 

land, Zululand are all part of the great undiscovered 
continent. Considering that all these lands have now 
been opened up and settled, so that where was formerly 
a hundred square miles of forest and prairie there is 
now the same area covered with plantations, towns, and 
farms, it will be understood that the British Empire has 
been increased not only in area, but in wealth, strength, 
and resources to an extent which would have been con- 
sidered incredible fifty years ago. It is, in fact, just the 
difference between owning a barren heath and owning 
a cultivated farm. The British Empire in 1837 con- 
tained millions of square miles of barren heath and wild 
forest, which are now settled land and smiling planta- 
tions. It boasted of vast countries, with hardly a single 
European in them, which are now filled with English 
towns. In 1837, prophets foretold the speedy downfall 
of an Empire which could no longer defend her vast 
territories. These territories can now defend them- 
selves. It may be that we shall have to fight for 
empire, but the longer the day of battle is put off the 
better it will be for England, and the greater will be 
her might. To carry on that war, there are now, 
scattered over the whole of the British Empire, fifty 
millions of people speaking the Anglo-Saxon tongue. 
In fifty years' time there will be two hundred millions 
in Great Britain, Ireland, Australia, Africa, Asia, New 
Zealand, and the Isles, with another two hundred 
millions in the States. If the English-speaking races 
should decide to unite in a vast confederacy, all the 



GREAT BRITAIN, IRELAND, THE COLONIES ii 

other Powers on the earth combined will not be able to 
do them an injury. Perhaps after this life we shall be 
allowed to see what goes on in the world. If so, there 
is joy in store for the Briton ; if not, we have been born 
too soon. 

Next to the extension and development of the 
Empire comes the opening up of new countries. We 
have rescued since the year 1837 the third part of 
Africa from darkness ; we have found the sources of 
the Nile ; we have traced the great Eiver Congo from 
its source to its mouth ; we have explored the whole 
of Southern Africa ; we have rediscovered the great 
African lakes which were known to the Jesuits in the 
seventeenth century ; in Australia we have crossed and 
recrossed the continent ; the whole of North America 
has been torn from the Eed Indians, and is now settled 
in almost every part. 

If the progress of Great Britain has been great, that 
of the United States has been amazing. Along the 
Pacific shore, where were fifty years ago sand and rock 
and snow, where formerly the sluggish Mexican kept his 
ranch and the Eed Indian hunted the buffalo, great 
towns and American States now flourish. Arkansas 
and Missouri were frontier Western States ; Michigan 
was almost without settlers ; Chicago was a little place 
otherwise called Fort Dearborn. The population of the 
States was still, except for the negroes, and a few de- 
scendants of Germans, Dutch, and Swedes, chiefly of 
pure British descent. As yet there were in America 



12 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



few Irish, Germans (except in Pennsylvania), Nor- 
wegians, or Italians. Yet the people, much more than 
now our cousins, held little friendly feeling towards the 




NAPOLEON AT LONGWOOD 
(From a Drawing made in 1820) 



Mother Country, and lacked the kindly sentiment which 
has grown up of late years ; they were quite out of 
touch with us, strangers to us, and yet sjpeaking our 



GREAT BRITAIN, IRELAND, THE COLONIES 13 

tongue, reading our literature, and governed by our 
laws. 

As soon as the battle of Waterloo was fairly fought 
and Napoleon put away at St. Helena, the Continental 
professors, historians, political students, and journalists 
all began with one accord to prophesy the approaching 
downfall of Great Britain, wliich some affected to deplore 
and others regarded with complacency. Everything 
conspired, it was evident, not only to bring about this 
decline, but also to accelerate it. The parallel of Car- 
thage — England has always been set up as the second 
Carthage — was freely exhibited, especially in those 
countries which felt themselves called upon and quah- 
fied to play the part of Eome. It was pointed out that 
there was the dreadful deadweight of Ireland, with its 
incurable poverty and discontent; the approaching decay 
of trade, which could be only, in the opinion of these 
keen- sighted philosophers, a matter of a few years ; the 
enormous weight of the National Debt ; the ruined 
manufacturers; the wasteful expenditure of the Govern- 
ment in every bi'anch ; the corrupting influence of the 
Poor Laws ; the stain of slavery ; the restrictions of 
commerce ; the intolerance of the Church ; the narrow- 
ness and prejudice of the Universities ; the ignorance 
of the people ; their drinking habits ; the vastness of 
the Empire. These causes, together with discontent, 
chartism, repubhcanism, atheism — in fact, all the dis- 
agreeablisms — left no doubt whatever that England was 
doomed. Foreigners, in fact, not yet recovered from 



u 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



the extraordinary spectacle of Great Britain's long duel 
with France and its successful termination, prophesied 
what they partly hoped out of envy and jealousy, and 
partly feared from self-interest. Therefore the poll- 




^ 


1^ Cir5 




LONDON 

(From 


STREET CH.U5ACTEKS, 1S37 
a Drawing by John Leech) 



ticians and professors were always looking at this 
country, writing about it, watching it, visiting it. No ; 
there could be no doubt ; none of these changes and 
dangers could be denied ; the factories were choked with 



GREAT BRITAIN, IRELAND, THE COLONIES 15 

excessive production ; poverty stalked through the 
country ; the towns were filled with ruined women ; 
the streets were cumbered with drunken men ; the 
children were growing up in ignorance and neglect in- 
conceivable; what could come of all this but ruin? 
Even — and this was the most wonderful and incredible 
thing to those who do not understand how long a Briton 
will go on enduring wrongs and suffering anomalies — 
the very House- of Commons in this boasted land of 
freedom did not represent half the people, seats were 
openly bought and sold, others were filled with nomi- 
nees of the great men who owned them. What could 
possibly follow but ruin — swift and hopeless ruin ? 
What, indeed ? Prophets of disaster always omit one 
or two important elements in their calculations, and it 
is through these gaps that the people basely wriggle, 
instead of fulfilling prophecy as they ought to do. For 
instance, there is the recuperative power of Man, and 
there is his individuality. He may be full of moral 
disease, yet such is his excellent constitution that he 
presently recovers — he shakes off his evil habits as 
he shakes the snow off his shoulders, and goes on an 
altered creature. Again, the mass of men may be in 
heavy case, but the individual man is patient ; he has 
strength to suffer and endure until he can pull through 
the worst ; he has patience to wait for better times ; 
difficulties only call forth his ingenuity and his resource : 
disaster stiffens his back, danger finds him brave. 
Always, to the prophet who knows not Man, the case 



i6 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



is hopeless. Always, to one who considers that by 
gazing into the looking-glass, especially immediately 
before or after his morning bath, he may perceive his 
brother as well as himself, things are hopeful. My 
brother, have things, at your worst, ever been, morally, 
so bad with you that you have despaired of recovery, 
seeing that you had only to resolve and you were 
cured ? Have you ever reflected that while, to the 
outside world, to your maiden aunts and to your female 




5 GEEAT CHEYNE ROW 

(The Housft in which Carlyle lived from 183i 
to his death in 188 1> 



cousins, you were most certainly drifting to moral 
wreck and material ruin, you have gone about the 
world with a hopeful heart, feeling that tlie future 
was in your own grasp? Even now the outlook of 
the whole world is truly dark, and the clouds are 
lowering. Yet surely the outlook w^as darker, the 
clouds were blacker, fifty years ago. Eead Carlyle's 
' Past and Present,' and compare. There may be other 
dangers before us of which we then suspected nothing. 







7. Gi-^^e^ 



GREAT BRITAIN, IRELAND, THE COLONIES 17 

But if we still preserve the qualities which enabled 
us to stand up, almost alone, against the colossal force 
of Napoleon, with Europe at his back, and which 
carried us through the terrible troubles which followed 
the war, we surely need not despair. 




THE DUCHESS OF KENT, WITH THE PRXNCEBS VICTOKIA AT THE AOE OF TWO 
(From the Picture by Sir W. Beechey at Windsor Castle 



i8 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



CHAPTER II. 

THE YEAR 1837. 

The year 1837, except for the 
death of the old King and the 
accession of the young Queen, 
was a tolerably insignificant 
year. It was on June 20 that 
the King died. He was buried 
on the evening of July 9 at St. 
George's Chapel, Windsor ; on 
the 10th the Queen dissolved 
Parliament; on the loth she 
went to Buckingham Palace ; 
and on November 9 she visited 
the City, where they gave her a 
magnificent banquet, served in 
Guildhall at half past five, the 
Lord Mayor and City magnates 
humbly taking their modest 
meal at a lower table. Both 
the hour appointed for the 
banquet and the humility of 

the Lord Mayor and Aldermen point to a remote 

period. 




WILLIAM IV. 

(From a Drawing by HB.) 



THE YEAR 1837 19 

The year began with the influenza. Everybody 
had it. The offices of the various departments of the 
Civil Service were deserted because all the clerks had 
influenza. Business of all kinds was stopped because 
merchants, clerks, bankers, and brokers all had influ- 
enza; at Woolwich fifty men of the Eoyal Artillery 
and Engineers were taken into hospital daily, with 
influenza. The epidemic seems to have broken out 
suddenly, and suddenly to have departed. Another 
important event of the year was the establishment of 
steam communication with India by way of the Red 
Sea. The ' Atalanta ' left Bombay on October 2, and 
arrived at Suez on October 16. The mails were brought 
into Alexandria on the 20th, and despatched, such was 
the celerity of the authorities, on November 7 by H.M.S. 
' Volcano.' They reached Malta on the 11th, Gibraltar 
on the 16th, and England on December 4, taking sixty 
days in all, of which, however, eighteen days were 
wasted in Alexandria, so that the possible time of 
transit from Bombay to England was proved to be 
forty-two days. 

This was the year of the Greenacre murder. The 
wretched man was under promise to marry an elderly 
woman, thinking she had money. One night, while 
they were drinking together, she confessed that she 
had none, and had deceived him ; whereupon, seized 
with wrath, he took up whatever weapon lay to his 
hand, and smote her on the head so that she fell back- 
wards dead. Now mark : if this man had gone straight 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



to the nearest police-office, and confessed tlie crime of 
liomicide, he would certainly have escaped hanging. 
But he was so horribly frightened at what had happened, 
that he tried to hide the thing by cutting up the body 
and bestowing the fragments in various places, all of 
them the most likely to be discovered. There was 

another woman in the 
case, proved to have 
b(ien in his confidence, 
and tried with him, 
when all the pieces 
had been recovered, 
and the murder was 
brought home to him. 
He was found guilty 
and hanged. And 
never was there a 
hanging more numer- 
ously or more fashion- 
ably attended. The 
principal performer, 
however, is said to 
have disappointed his audience by a pusillanimous 
shrinking from the gallows when he was brought out. 
The woman was sent to Australia, where, perhaps, she 
still survives. 

There was also, this year, an extremely scandalous 
action in the High Court of Justice. It was a libel 
case brought by Lord de Eos, and arose out of a gam- 




% i 




THE YEAR 1S37 21 

bling quarrel, in which his lordship was accused of 
cheating at cards. It was said that, under pretence of 
a bad cough and asthma, he kept diving under the 
table and fishing up kings and aces, a thing which 
seems of elementary simplicity, and capable of clear 
denial. His lordship, in fact, did deny it, stoutly and 
on oath. Yet the witnesses as stoutly swore that he 
did do this thing, and the jury found that he did. 
Whereupon his lordship retired to the Continent, and 
shortly afterwards died, 5./?., without offspring to lament 
his errors. 

There was a terrible earthquake this year in the 
Holy Land. The town of Safed was laid in ruins, and 
more than four thousand of the people were killed. 
There was a project against the life of Louis-Philippe, 
by one Champion, who was arrested. He was base 
enough to hang himself in prison, so that no one ever 
knew if he had any accomplices. 

The news arrived also of a dreadful massacre in 
New Zealand. There was only one English settlement 
in the country ; it was at a place called Makuta, in the 
North Island, where a Mr. Jones, of Sydney, had a 
fiax establishment, consisting of 120 people, men, 
women, and children. They were attacked by a party 
of 800 natives, and were all barbarously murdered. 

A fatal duel was fought on Hampstead Heath, near 
the Spaniards Tavern. The combatants were a 
Colonel Haring, of the Pohsh army, and another Polish 
officer, who was shot. The seconds carried him to the 



22 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

Middlesex Hospital, where he died, and nothing more 
was said about it. 

The dangers of emigration were illustrated by the 
voyage of the good ship ' Diamond,' of Liverpool. She 
had on board a party of passengers emigrating to New 
York. In the good old sailing days, the passengers 




THE SPANIARDS TAVERN, HAMPSTEAD 



were expected to lay in their own provisions, the ship 
carrying water for them. Now the ' Diamond ' met with 
contrary winds, and was ninety days out, three times 
as long as was expected. The ship had no more than 
enough provisions for the crew, and when the passen- 
gers had exhausted their store their sufferings were 
terrible. 



THE YEAR 1837 23 

An embassy from the King of Madagascar arrived 
this year, and was duly presented at Court. I know 
not what business they transacted, but the fact has a 
certain interest for me because it was my privilege, about 
four-and-twenty years ago, to converse with one of the 
nobles who had formed part of that embassy, and who, 
after a quarter of a century, was going again on another 
mission to the Court of St. James. He was, when I saw 
him, an elderly man, dark of skin, but, being a Hova, 
most intelligent and well-informed ; also, being a Hova, 
anxious to say the thing which would please his hearers. 
He recalled many incidents connected with the long 
journey round the Cape in a sailing vessel, the crowds 
and noise of London, the venerable appearance of King 
William, and his general kindness to the ambassadors. 
When he had told us all he could recollect, he asked 
us if we should like to hear him sing the song which 
had beguiled many weary hours of his voyage. We 
begged him to sing it, expecting to hear something 
national and fresh, something redolent of the Mada- 
gascar soil, a song sung in the streets of its capital, An- 
tananarivo, perhaps with a breakdown or a walk round. 
Alas ! he neither danced a breakdown, nor did he walk 
round, nor did he sing us a national song at all. He 
only piped, in a thin sweet tenor, and very correctly, 
that familiar hymn ' Rock of Ages,' to the familiar tune. 
I have never been able to believe that this nobleman. 
His Excellency the Eight Honourable the Lord Eaini- 
feringalarovo. Knight of the Fifteen Honour, entitled 



24 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



to wear a lamba as highly striped as they are made, 
commonly reported to be a pagan, with several wives, 
really comforted his soul, while at sea, with this hymn 
But he was with Christians, and this was a missionary's 
hymn which he had often heard, and it would doubtless 
please us to hear it sung. Thereupon he sang it, and 
a dead silence fell upon us. Behold however, the 




SIK ROBERT PEEL 



reason why the record of this simple event, the arrival 
of the embassy from Madagascar, strikes a chord in 
the mind of one at least who reads it. There is little 
else to chronicle in the year. The University of Dur- 
ham w^as founded : a truly brilliant success have they 
made of this learned foundation ! And Sir Eobert Peel 
was Eector of Glasgow University. For the rest, 



THE YEAR 1837 25 

boilers burst, coaches were upset, and many books of 
immense genius were produced, which now repose in 
the Museum. 

Yet a year which marked the close of one period 
and the commencement of another. The steamship 
' Atalanta ' carrying the bags to Suez — what does this 
mean? The massacre in New Zealand of the only 
white men on the island — what does this portend? 
The fatal duel at Hampstead ; the noble lord convicted 
of cheating at cards ; the emigrant ship ninety days 
out with no food for the passengers — what are these 
things but illustrations of a time that has now passed 
away, the passage from the eighteenth to the nineteenth 
century ? For there are no longer any duels ; noble 
lords no longer gamble, unless they are very young 
and foolish ; ships no longer take passengers without 
food for them ; we have lessened the distance to India 
by three-fourths, measured by time ; and the Maoris 
will rise no more, for their land is filled with the white 
men. 

In that year, also, there were certain ceremonies 
observed which have now partly fallen into disuse. 

For instance, on Twelfth Day it was the custom 
for confectioners to make in their windows a brave 
show of Twelfth -cakes ; it was also the custom of the 
public to flatten their noses against the windows and 
to gaze upon the treasures displayed to view. It was, 
further, the custom — one of the good old annual cus- 
toms, like beating the bounds — for the boys to pin 



26 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

togetlier those who were thus engaged by their coat- 
tails, shawls, skirts, sleeves, the ends of comforters, 
wrappers, and boas, and other outlying portions of 
raiment. When they discovered the trick — of course 
they only made pretence at being unconscious — by the 
rending, tearing, and destruction of their garments, 
they never failed to fall into ecstasies of (pretended) 
wrath, to the joy of the children, who next year re- 




A TAiaSH Uli.Vill,Ji 

(From a Drawing by George Cruikshank in ' London Characters ') 

peated the trick with the same success I think there 
are no longer any Twelfth-cakes, and I am sure that 
the boys have forgotten that trick. 

On Twelfth Day the Bishop of London made an 
offering in the Chapel Eoyal of St. James's in com- 
memoration of the Wise Men from the East. Is that 
offering made still ? and, if so, what does his lordship 
offer? and with what prayers, or hopes, or expecta- 
tions, is that offering made ? 



THE YKAK 1837 27 

At the commencement of Hilary Term the judcres 
took breakfast with the Lord Chancellor, and after- 
wards drove in state to Westminster. 

On January 30, King Charles's Day, the Lords went 
in procession to Westminster Abbey and the Commons 
to St. Margaret's, both Houses to hear the Service of 
Commemoration. Where is that service now ? 

On Easter Sunday the Eoyal Family attended Divine 
Service at St. James's, and received the Sacrament. 

On Easter Monday the Lord Mayor, Sheriffs, and 
Aldermen went in state to Christ Church, formerly the 
Church of the Grey Friars, and heard service. In the 
evening there was a great banquet, with a ball. A 
fatiguing day for my Lord Mayor. 

Easter Monday was also the day of the Epping 
Hunt. Greenwich Fair was held on that and the two 
following days. And in Easter week the theatres played 
pieces for children. 

On the first Sunday in Easter the Lord Mayor and 
Sheriffs went in state to St. Paul's, and had a banquet 
afterwards. 

On May Day the chimney-sweeps had their annual 
holiday. 

On Ascension Day they made a procession of parish 
functionaries and parochial schools, and beat the bounds, 
and, to mark them well in the memory of all, they beat 
the charity children who attended the beadle, and they 
beat all the boys they caught on the way, and they 
banged against the boundaries all the strangers who 



28 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



passed within their reach. When it oame to banging 
the strangers, they had a high old time. 

On the Queen's Birthday there was a splendid pro- 
cession of stage coaches from Piccadilly to the Post 
Office. 

Lastly, on September 3, Bartholomew Fair was 




EVENING IN SMITHFIELD 

(From a Drawing made in 1858, at the gateway leading into Clotli Pair, the place of 
proclamation of Bartholomew Pair) 



opened by the Lord Mayor, and then followed what 
our modern papers are wont to call a carnival, but what 
the papers of 1837 called, without any regard to pic- 
turesque writing, a scene of unbridled profligacy, 
licentiousness, and drunkenness, with fisfliting, both of 



THE YEAR 1837 29 

fists and cudgels, pumping on pickpockets, robbery and 
cheating, noise and shouting, the braying of trumpets 
and the banging of drums. If you want to know what 
this ancient fair was like, go visit the Agricultural Hall 
at Christmas. They have the foolish din and noise of 
it, and if the people were drunk, and there were no 
police, and everybody was ready and most anxious to 
fight, and the pickpockets, thieves, bullies, and black 
guards were doing what they pleased, you would have 
Bartholomew Fair complete. 



-,o FIFTY YEARS AGO 



CHAPTER m. 

LONDON IN 1837. 

The extent of London in 1837, that is to say, of close 
and continuous London, may be easily understood by 
drawing on the map a red line a little above the south 
side of Regent's Park. This line must be prolonged 
west until it strikes the Edgware Road, and eastward 
until it strikes the Regent's Canal, after which it follows 
the Canal until it falls into the Regent's Canal Docks. 
This is, roughly speaking, the boundary of the great 
city on the north and east. Its western boundary is 
the lower end of the Edgware Road, Park Lane, and a 
line drawn from Hyde Park Corner to Westminster 
Bridge. The river is its southern boundary, but if you 
wish to include the Borough, there will be a narrow 
fringe on the south side. This was the whole of London 
proper, that is to say, not the City of London, or London 
with her suburbs, but continuous London. If you look 
at Mr Loftie's excellent map of London,^ showing the 
extent built upon at different periods, you will find a 
greater area than this ascribed to London at this period. 
That is because Mr. Loftie has chosen to include many 
parts which at this time were suburbs of one street, 

* Loftie's History of London. Stanford, 1884. 



LONDON IN 1837 



31 



straggling houses, with fields, nurseries, and market- 
gardens. Thus Kennington, Brixton, and Camberwell 
are included. But these suburban places were not in 
any sense part of continuous London. Open fields and 
gardens were lying behind the roads ; at the north end 
of Kennington Common — then a dreary expanse uncared 
for and down-trodden — lay open ponds and fields ; there 
were fields between VauxhalL Gardens and the Oval. If 
we look at the north of London, 
there were no houses round Prim- 
rose Hill ; fields stretched north and 
east ; to the west one or two roads 
were already pushing out, such as 
the Abbey Eoad and Avenue Eoad ; 
through the pleasant fields of Kil- 
burn, where still stood the pictur- 
esque fragments of Kilburn Priory, 
the Bayswater rivulet ran pleasantly; 
it was joined by two other brooks, 
one rising in St. John's Wood, and 
flowing through what are now called Craven Gardens 
into the Serpentine. On Haverstock Hill were a few 
villas ; Chalk Farm still had its farm buildings ; Belsize 
House, with its park and lake, was the nearest house to 
Primrose Hill. A few houses showed the site of Kentish 
Town, while Camden Town was then a village, clustered 
about its High Street in the Hampstead Eoad. Even 
the York and Albany Tavern looked out back and front 
on fields ; Mornington Crescent gazed across its garden 




32 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

upon open fields and farms ; the great burial-ground of 
St. James's Church had fields at the back ; behind St. 
Pancras' Churchyard stretched ' Mr. Agar's Farm ; * 
Islington was little more than a single street, with 
houses on either side ; Bagnigge Wells — it stood at the 
north-east of St. Andrew's Burying-ground in Gray's 
Inn Eoad — was still in full swing ; Hoxton had some of 
its old houses still standing, with the Haberdashers' 
Almshouses ; the rest was laid out in nurseries and 
gardens. King's Cross was Battle Bridge ; and Penton- 
ville was only in its infancy. 

Looking at this comparatively narrow area, consider 
the enormous growth of fifty years. What was Bow ? 
A little village. What was Stratford, now a town of 
70,000 people? There was no Stratford. Bromley 
was a waste ; Dalston, Clapham, Hackney, Tottenham, 
Canonbury, Barnsbury — these were mere villages ; now 
they are great and populous towns. But perhaps the 
change is more remarkable still when one considers the 
West End. All that great cantlet lying between Mary- 
lebone Road and Oxford Street was then much in the 
same state as now, though with some difference in detail; 
thus, one is surprised to find that the south of Blandford 
Square was occupied by a great nursery. But west of 
Edgware Road there was next to nothing. Connaught 
Square was already built, and the ground between the 
Grand Junction Road and the Bays water Road was just 
laid out for building ; but the great burying-ground of 
St. George's, now hidden from view and built round. 



LONDON IN \^n 33 

was in fields. The whole length of the Bayswater Road 
ran aloncr market-gardens ; a few houses stood in St. 
Petersburg Place ; Westbourne Green had hardly a 
cottage on it ; Westbourne Park was a green enclosure ; 
there were no houses on Notting Hill ; Campden Hill 
had only one or two great houses, and a field-path led 
pleasantly from Westbourne Green to the Kensington 
Gravel Pits. 

On the west and south-west the Neat Houses, with 
their gardens, occupied the ground west of Vauxhall 
Bridge. Earl's Court, with its great gardens and mound, 
stood in the centre of the now crowded and dreary 
suburb ; south of the Park stood many great houses, 
such as Rutland House, now destroyed and replaced by 
terraces and squares. But though London was then so 
small compared with its present extent, it was already 
a most creditable city. Those who want more figures 
will be pleased to read that at the census of 1831 London 
contained 14,000 acres, or nearly twenty-two square 
miles. This area was divided into 153 parishes, con- 
taining 10,000 streets and courts and 250,000 houses. 
Its population was 1,646,288. Fifty years before it was 
half that number, fifty years later it was double that 
number. We may take the population of the year 1837 
as two millions. 

More figures. There were 90,000 passengers across 
London Bridge every day, there were 1,200 cabriolets, 
600 hackney coaches, and 400 omnibuses ; there were 
30,000 deaths annually. The visitors every year were 



34 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



estimated at 12,000. Among the residents were 130,000 
Scotchmen, 200,000 Irish, and 30,000 French. These 
figures convey to my own mind very little meaning, but 

they look big, and so I have put 
them down. Speaking roughly, 
London fifty years ago was twice 
as big as Paris is now, or the 
present New York. 

As for the buildings of Lon- 
don proper, fifty years have 
witnessed many changes, and 
have brought many losses^more 
losses, perhaps, than gains. The 
Eoyal Exchange, built by Edward 
Jerman in place of Sir Thomas 
Gresham's of 1570, was burnt to 
tlie ground on January 10, 1838. The present building, 
designed by Sir William Tite, was opened by the Queen 




HACKNEY COACHMAN 

(From a Drawing by George Cruik- 
shank in ' London Ciiaracters') 







THE FIRST LONDON EXCHANGE 



in person on October 28, 1844. Jerman's Exchange was 
a quadrangular building, with a clock-tower of timber 



LONDON IN 1837 35 

on the Cornliill side. It had an inner cloister and a 
' pawn,' or gallery, above for the sale of fancy goods. It 
was decorated by a series of statues of the Kings, from 




THE SECOND LONDON EXCHANGE 



Edward I. to George IV. Sion College, which until the 
otlier day stood in the street called London Wall, was 




THE PRESENT ROYAL EXCHANGK (THIRD LONDON EXCHANGE) 

not yet wantonly and wickedly destroyed by those who 
should have been its natural and official protectors, the 

London clero-y. 
5* 



36 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

Tilings happen so quickly that one easily forgets ; 
yet let me pay a farewell tribute and drop a tear 
to the memory of the most delightful spot in the 
whole of London. The building was not of extreme 
age, but it stood upon the ancient site of Elsinge Spital, 
which itself stood upon the site of the old Cripple- 
gate Nunnery; it was founded in 1623 by the will 
of one Dr. Thomas White, Vicar of St. Dunstan's-in- 
the-West ; the place was damaged by the Great Fire, 
and little of the building was older, I believe, than 1690. 
or thereabouts. But one stepped out of the noise and 
hurry of the very heart of London into a courtyard 
where the air was instantly hushed ; on the right hand 
were the houses of the almsmen and women, though 1 
believe they had of late ceased to occupy them. Above 
the almshouses was the long narrow library crammed 
with books, the sight and fragrance of which filled 
the grateful soul with joy. On the left side of the 
court was the Hall used for meetings, and open all day 
to the London clergy for reading the magazines, reviews, 
and papers. A quiet, holy place. Fuller wrote his 
' Church History ' in this college ; the illustrious Psalma- 
nazar wrote here his ' Universal History ' — it was after 
he repented of his colossal lies, and had begun to live 
cleanly. Two hundred and fifty years have witnessed 
a long succession of London clergymen, learned and 
devout most of them, reading in this library and meet- 
ing in this hall. Now it is pulled down, and a huge ware- 
house occupies its place. The London clergy them- 



LONDON IN 1837 



37 



selves, for the sake of gain, have sold it. And, as for 
the garish thing they have stuck up on the Embank- 
ment, they may call it what they like, but it is not Sion 
College. 

Another piece of wanton wickedness was the de- 
struction of Northumberland House. It is, of course, 
absurd to say that its removal was required. The re- 
moval of a great historic house can never be required. 
It was the last of the great houses, with the exception 







CHARING CROSS IN THE PRESENT DAT 



of Somerset House, and tliat is nearly all modern, 
having been erected in 17T6-17S6 on the site of the 
old palace. 

The Strand, indeed, is very much altered since the 
year 1837. At the west end the removal of Northum- 
berland House has been followed by the building of the 



38 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

Grand Hotel, and the opening of the Northumberland 
Avenue : the Charing Cross Station and Hotel have 
been erected : two or three new theatres have been 
added : Temple Bar has been taken down — in any other 
country the old gate would have been simply left stand- 
ing, because it was an ancient historical monument ; 
they would have spared it and made a roadway oh 
either side ; tlie rookeries which formerly stood on the 




TKMPLE BAB 



north side close to the Bar have been swept away, and 
the Law Courts stand in their place — where the rooks 
are gone it is impossible to say. I myself dimly 
remember a labyrinth of lanes, streets, and courts on 
this site. They were inhabited, I beheve, by low-class 
solicitors, money-lenders, racing and betting men, and 
by all kinds of adventurers. Did not Mr. Altamont 
have chambers here, when he visited Captain Costigan 



LONDON IN 1837 



39 



in Lyons Inn ? Ly^is Inn itself is pulled clown, and on 
its site is the Globe Theatre. 

As for churches, there has been such an enormous 
increase of churches in the last fifty years, that it seems 
churlish to lament the loss of half a dozen. But this 
half-dozen belongs to the City : they were churches 
built, for the most part, by Wren, on the site of ancient 
churches destroyed in the Fire ; they were all lial- 







THE ROYAL COURTS OF JUSTICE 



lowed by old and sacred associations ; many of them 
were interesting and curious for their architecture : in 
a word, they ought not to have been pulled down in 
order to raise hideous warehouses over their site. Greed 
of gain prevailed ; ' and they are gone. People found 
out that their number of worshippers was small, and 
argued that there was no longer any use for them. So 



40 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

they are gone, and can never be replaced. As for their 
names, they were the churches of Allhallows, Broad 
Street ; St. Benet's, Gracechurch Street ; St. Dionis 
Backchurch ; St. Michael's, Queenhithe ; St. Antholin's, 
Budge Eow ; St. Bene't Fink ; St. Mary Somerset ; St. 
Mary Magdalen ; and St. Matthew, Friday Street. The 
church of St. Michael, Crooked Lane, in which was 
the grave of Sir William Walworth, disappeared in the 
year 1831 ; those of St. Bartholomew by Eastcheap, 
and of St. Christopher-le-Stock, which stood on either 
side of the Bank, were taken down in the years 1802 
and 1781 respectively. The site of these old churches 
is generally marked by a small enclosure, grown over 
with thin grass, containing one, or at most two, tombs. 
It is about the size of a dining-room table, and you 
may read of it that the burying-ground of Saint So-and- 
so is still preserved. Indeed ! Were the City church- 
yards of such dimensions? The 'preservation' of the 
burial-grounds is like the respect which used to be paid 
to the First Day of the week in the early lustra of the 
Victorian Age by the tobacconist. He kept one shutter 
up. So the desecrators of the City churchyards, God's 
acre, the holy ground filled with the bones of dead 
citizens, measured off a square yard or tvro, kept one 
tomb, and built their warehouses over all the rest. 

All round London the roads were blocked everywhere 
by turnpikes. It is difficult to understand the annoy- 
ance of being stopped continually to show a pass or to 
pay the pike. Thus, there were two or three turnpikes 



LONDON IN 1837 



41 



in what is now called the Euston Eoad, and was then 
the New Eoad ; one of them was close to Great Portland 
Street, another at Gower Street. At Battle Brido-e, 
which is now King's Cross, there were two, one on the 
east, and one on tlie west ; there was a pike in St. John 
Street, Clerkenwell. There were two in the City Eoad, 




LYONS INN IN 1804 
(From an Engraving in Herbert's ' History of the Inns of Court ') 



and one in New North Eoad, Hoxton ; one at Shoreditch, 
one in Bethnal Green Eoad, one in Commercial Eoad. 
No fewer than three in East India Dock Eoad, three in 
the Old Kent Eoad, one in Bridge Street, Vauxhall ; one 
in Great Surrey Street, near the Obelisk ; one at Kenning- 
ton Church — what man turned of forty cannot remember 



42 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

the scene at tlie turnpike on Derby Day, wlien hundreds 
of carriages would be stopped while the pikeman was 
fighting for his fee ? Tliere was a turnpike named after 
Tyburn, close to Marble Arch ; another at the beginning 
of Kensington Gardens ; one at St. James's Church, 
Hampstead Road. Ingenious persons knew how to 
avoid the pike by making a long detour. 

The turnpike has gone, and the pikemnn with his 




KENNINGTON GATE — PKRBY DAY 



apron has gone — nearly everybody's apron has gone 
too — and the gates have been removed. That is a clear 
gain. But there are also losses. What, for instance, 
has become of all the baths? Surely we have not, as 
a nation, ceased to desire cleanliness ? Yet in reading 
the list of the London baths fifty years ago one cannot 
choose but ask the question. St. Annice-le-Clair used 
to be a medicinal spring, considered efficacious in 



LONDON IN 1837 



43 



rheumatic cases. Who stopped that spring and built 
upon its site ? The Peerless Pool close beside it was 
the best swimming bath in all London. When was 
that filled up and built over ? Where are St. Chad's 
Wells now ? Formerly they were in Gray's Inn Poad, 
near ' Battle Bridge,' which is now King's Cross, and 
their waters saved many an apothecary's bill. There 




THE OLD ROMAN BATH IN THE STRAND 



were swimming baths in Shepherdess Walk, near the 
almshouses. When were they destroyed ? There was 
another in Cold Bath Fields ; the spring, a remarkably 
cold one, still runs into a bath of marble slabs, repre- 
sented to have been laid for Mistress Nell Gwynne in 
the days of the Merry Monarch. Curiously, the list 
from which I am quoting does not mention the most 



44 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

delightful bath of all — the old Roman Bath in the 
Strand. I remember making the acquaintance of this 
bath long ago, in the fifties, being then a student at 
King's. The water is icy cold, but fresh and bright, 
and always running. The place is never crowded ; 
hardly anybody seems to know that here, in the heart 
of London, is a monument of Roman times, to visit 
which, if it were at Aries or Avignon, people would go 
all the way from London. Some day, no doubt, we 
shall hear that it has been sold and destroyed, like Sion 
College, and the spring built over. 



CHAPTER IV. 

IN THE STEEET. 

Let us, friend Eighty-seven, take a walk down the 
Strand on this fine April afternoon of Thirty-seven. 
First, however, you must alter your dress a little. Put 
on this swallow-tail coat, with the high velvet collar — 
it is more becoming than the sporting coat in green 
bulging out over the hips ; change your light tie and 
masher collar for this beautiful satin stock and this 
double breastpin ; put on a velvet waistcoat and an 
under-waistcoat of cloth ; thin Cossack trousers with 
straps will complete your costume ; turn your shirt 
cuffs back outside the coat sleeve, carry your gloves in 
youi handj and take your cane. You are now, dear 
Eighty-seven, transformed into the dandy of fifty years 
ago, and will not excite any attention as we walk along 
the street. 

We will start from Charing Cross and will walk 
towards the City. You cannot remember, Eighty-seven, 
the King's Mews that stood here on the site of Trafalgar 
Square. When it is completed, with the National 
Gallery on the north side., the monument and statue of 
Nelson, the fountains and statues that they talk about, 
there will be a very fine square. And we have cer- 



46 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



tainly got rid of a group of mean and squalid streets 
to make room for the square. It is lucky that they 
have left Northumberland House, the last of the great 
palaces that once luied the Strand. 




LONDON STREET CHARACTF.US, 1827 

(From a Drawing by John Leech) 



The Strand looks very much as it will in your time, 
though the shop fronts are not by any means so fine. 
There is no Charing Cross Station or Northumberland 
Avenue ; most of the shops have bow windows and 



IN THE STREET 



47 



there is no plate-glass, but instead, small panes such 
as you will only see here and there in your time. The 
people, however, have a surprisingly different appear- 
ance. The ladies, because the east wind is cold, still 
keep to their fur tippets, their thick shawls, and have 
their necks wrapped round with boas, the ends of 
which hang down to their skirts, a fashion revived by 






3 , ri n 3 



n n nf Dlyi] j n| ph n n li 



n B 



'|:&iafi;TO[|t^ 



IHE king's mews in 1^5^ 

(From a Print by I. Maurer) 

yourself; their bonnets are remarkable structures, like 
an ornamental coal-scuttle of the Thirty- seven, not the 
Eighty-seven, period, and some of them are of sur- 
prising dimensions, and decorated with an amazing pro- 
fusion of ribbons and artificial flowers. Their sleeves 
are shaped like a leg of mutton ; their shawls are like 
a dining-room carpet of the time — not like your 

dining-room carpet. Eighty-seven, but a carpet of 
6 



48 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



fiaimting colour, crimson and scarlet which would 
give you a headache. But the curls of the younger 
ladies are not without their cliarms, and their eyes 
are as bright as those of their grandchildren, are 
they not ? 

Let us stand still awhile and watch the throng 
where tlie tide of life, as Johnson said, is the fullest. 




BAlUiACli ANL> OLD HOUSES ON THE SITE OT TRAFALGAB SQUARE 
(From a Drawing made by F. W. Fairholt in 1826) 

Here comes, with a roll intended for a military 
swagger, the cheap dandy. I know not what he is by 
trade ; he is too old for a medical student, not shabby 
enough for an attorney's clerk, and not respectable 
enough for a City clerk. Is it possible that he is a 
young gentleman of very small fortune which he is 
runninc? through ? He wears a tall hat broader at the 



IN THE STREET 



49 



top than at the bottom, he carries white thread gloves, 
sports a cane, has his trousers tightly strapped, wears a 
tremendously high stock, with a sham diamond pin, a 
coat with a velvet collar, and a double-breasted waist- 



coat. His right hand is stuck- 



-it IS an aggressive 



attitude — in his coat-tail pocket. The little old gentle- 
man who follows him, in black shorts and white silk 
stockings, will be gone 
before your time ; so will 
yonder still more ancient 
gentleman in powdered 
hair and pigtail who walks 
slowly along. Pigtails in 
your time will be clean 
forgotten as well as black 
silk shorts. 

Do you see that thin, 
spare gentleman in the 
cloak, riding slowly along 

the street followed bv a (From the Drawing by George Crulksbank 

J m ' Sketches by Boz ) 

mounted servant ? The 

people all take off their hats respectfully to him, and 
country folk gaze upon him curiously. That is the 
Duke. There is only one Duke to the ordinary Briton. 
It is the Duke witli the hook nose — the Iron Duke — 
the Duke of Wellington. 

The new-fashioned cabriolet, with a seat at the side 
for the driver and a high hood for the fare, is light and 
swift, but it is not beautiful nor is it popular. The 




THE LAST CABEIOLET DRIVER 



50 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

wheels are too high and the machine is too narrow. 
It is always upsetting, and bringing its passengers to 
grief. 

Here is one of the new police, with blue swallow- 
tail coat tightly buttoned, and white trousers. They 
are reported to be mightily unpopular with the light- 
fingered gentry, with whose pursuits they are always 
interfering in a manner unknown to the ancient 
Charley. 

Here comes a gentleman, darkly and mysteriously 
clad in a fur-lined cloak, fastened at his neck by a brass 
buckle, and falling to his feet, such a cloak as in your 
time will only be used to enwrap the villains in a 
burlesque. But here no one takes any notice of it. 
There goes a man who may have been an officer, an 
actor, a literary man, a gambler — anything ; whatever 
he was, he is now broken-down — his face is pale, his 
gait is shuffling, his elbows are gone, his boots are 
giving at the toes, and — see — the stout red-faced man 
■with the striped waistcoat and the bundle of seals 
hanging at his fob has tapped him on the shoulder. 
That is a sheriff's officer, and he will now be conducted, 
after certain formalities, to the King's Bench or the 
Fleet, and in this happy retreat he will probably pass 
the remainder of his days. Here comes a middle-aged 
gentleman who looks almost like a coachman in his 
coat with many capes and his purple cheeks. That is 
the famous coaching baronet, than whom no better 
whip has ever been seen upon the road. Here come a 



IN THE STREET 51 

pair of young bloods who scorn cloaks and greatcoats. 
How bravely do they tread in their tight trousers, 
bright-coloured waistcoats, and high satin stocks ! with 
what a jaunty air do they tilt their low-crowned hats 
over their long and waving locks — you can smell the 
bear's grease across the road ! with what a flourish do 
they bear their canes ! Here comes swaggering along 
the pavement a military gentleman in a coat much be- 
frogged. He has the appearance of one who knows 
Chalk Farm, which is situated among meadows where 
the morning air has been known to prove suddenly 
fatal to many gallant gentlemen. How he swings his 
shoulders and squares his elbows ! and how the peaceful 
passengers make room for him to pass ! He is, no 
doubt, an old Peninsular ; there are still many like unto 
him ; he is the ruffling Captain known to Queen Eliza- 
beth's time ; in the last century he took the wall and 
shoved everybody into the gutter. Presently he will 
turn into the Cigar Divan — he learned to smoke cisrars 
in Spain — in the rooms of what was once the Repository 
of Art ; we breathe more freely when he is gone. 

Here comes a great hulking sailor ; his face beams 
with honesty, he rolls in his gait, he hitches up his wide 
trousers, he wears his shiny hat at the back of his head ; 
his hair hangs in ringlets ; he chews a quid ; under his 
arm is a parcel tied in red bandanna. He looks as if 
he were in some perplexity. Sighting one who appears 
to be a gentleman recently from the country, he bears 
down upon him. 



52 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



' Noble captain,' he whispers hoarsely, ' if you like, 
here's a chance that doesn't come everyday. For why? 
I've got to go to sea again, and though they're smuggled 
— I smuggled them myself, your honour — and worth 
their weight in gold, you shall have the box for thirty 

shiliin'. Say the word, my cap- 
tain, and come round the corner 
with me.' 

Honest tar ! Shall we meet 
him to-morrow with another 
parcel tied in the same ban- 
danna, his face screwed up 
with the same perplexity and 
anxiety to get rid of his valu- 
able burden? You yourself, 
Eighty- seven, Avill have your 




A GEEENWICH PENSIONEK 

(From a Drawing by Oeorge Cruik- 
sbauk in ' London Cliaracters') 



confidence trick, your 



dropper, j^our thimble- and-pea, 
your fat partridge-seller, even though the bold smuggler 
be no more. 

In the matter of street music we of Thirty-seven are 
perhaps in advance of you of Eighty- seven. We have 
not, it is true, the pianoforte-organ, but we have al- 
ready the other two varieties — the Eumbling Droner 
and the Light Tinkler. We have not yet the street 
nigger, or the banjo, or the baud of itinerant blacks, 
or Christy's Minstrels. The negro minstrel does not 
exist in any form. But the ingenious Mr. Eice is at 
this very moment studying the plantation songs of 



IN THE STREET 53 

South Carolina, and we can already witness his humor- 
ous personation of 'Jump, Jim Crow,' and his pathetic 
ballad of ' Lucy Neal.' (He made his first appearance 
at the Adelphi as Jim Crow in 1836.) We have, like 
you, the Christian family in reduced circumstances, 
creeping slowly, hand in hand, along the streets, sing- 
ing a hymn the while for the consolation it affords. 
They have not yet invented Moody and Sankey, and 
therefore they cannot sing ' Hold the Fort ' or ' Dare 
to be a Daniel,' but there are hymns in every collection 




< O 



AN OMNIBUS UPSET 
(From Cruikshank's ' Comic Almanack') 



which suit the Gridler. We have also the ballad- 
singer, who warbles at the door of the gin-palace. His 
favourite song just now is ' All round my Hat.' We 
have the lady (or gentleman) who takes her (or his) 
place upon the kerb with a guitar, adorned with red 
ribbon, and sings a sentimental song, such as ' Speed 
on, my Mules, for Leila waits for me,' or ' Gaily the 
Troubadour ; ' there is the street seller of ballads at a 
penny each, a taste of which lie gives the delighted 
listener ; there are the horns of stao:e- coach and of 



54 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



omnibus, blown with zeal; there is the bell of the crier, 
exercised as religiously as that of the railway-porter ; 
the Pandean pipes and the drum walk, not only with 
Punch, but also with the dancing bear. The perform- 
ino- dogs, the street acrobats, and the fantoccini ; the 




EXETEE CHANGE 



noble Highlander not only stands outside the tobac- 
conist's, taking a pinch of snufl', but he also parades 
the street, blowing a most patriotic tune upon his bag- 
pipe ; the butcher serenades his young mistress with 
the cleaver and the bones ; the Italian boy delights all 
the ears of those who hear with his hurdy-gurdy. 



IN THE STREET 55 

Here comes the Paddington omnibus, the first omni- 
bus of all, started seven years ago by Mr. Shillibeer, the 
father of all those which have driven the short stages 
off the road, and now ply in every street. You will not 
fail to observe that the knifeboard has not yet been in- 
vented. There are twelve passengers inside and none 
out. The conductor is already remarkable for his 
truthfulness, his honesty, and his readiness to take up 
any lady and to deposit her within ten yards of wher- 
ever she wishes to be. The fare is sixpence, and you 
must wait for ten years before you get a twopenny 
'bus. 

Now let us resume our walk. The Strand is very 
little altered, you think. Already Exeter Change is 
gone ; Exeter Hall is already built ; the shops are less 
splendid, and plate glass is as yet unknown ; in Holy- 
well Street I can show you one or two of the old signs 
still on the house walls ; Butcher Eow, behind St. Cle- 
ment Danes, is pulled down and the street widened ; on 
the north side there is standing a nest of rookeries and 
mean streets, where you will have your Law Courts ; 
here is Temple Bar, which you will miss ; close to 
Temple Bar is the little fish shop which once belonged 
to Mr. Crockford, the proprietor of the famous club ; 
the street messengers standing about in their white 
aprons will be gone in your time ; for that matter, so 
will the aprons ; at present every other man in the 
street wears an apron. It is a badge of his rank and 
station ; the apron marks the mechanic or the serving- 



56 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



man ; some wear white aprons and some wear leather 
aprons ; I am afraid you will miss the apron. 

Fleet Street is much more picturesque than the 







'''^i^<'^^rnijk^^^( 



THE PARISH ENGINE 

(From a Drawing by George Cruikshank in Sketches by Boz ') 

Strand, is it not? Even in your day, Eighty-seven, 
when so many old houses will have perished, Fleet Street 
will still be the most picturesque street in all Ijoncjon. 



IN THE STREET 



57 



The true time to visit it is at four o'clock on a summer 
morning, when the sun has just risen on the sleeping 
city. Look at the gables of it, the projecting stories 
of it, the old timber work of it, the glory and the 




CROCKFORD S FISH SHOP 
( From a Drawing by F. W. Fairholt) 



beauty of it. As you see Fleet Street, so Dr. Johnson 
saw it. 

There is a good deal more crowd and animation in 
Fleet Street than in the Strand. That is because we 
are nearer the City, of course ; the traffic is greater ; 



58 FII'TY YEARS AGO 

the noise is much greater. As for this ring before us, 
let us avoid it. A coachman fighting a ticket-porter 
is a daily spectacle in this thoroughfare ; those who 
crowd round often get bloody noses for their pains, 
and still more ofren come away without their purses. 
Look ! The pickpockets are at their work almost 
openly. They have caught one. Well, my friend, our 
long silk purses — yours will be square leather things — 
are very easily stolen. I do not think it will repay you 
for the loss of yours to see a poor devil of a pickpocket 
pumped upon. 

You are looking again at the plain windows with 
the small square panes. The shops make no display as 
yet, you see. First, it would not be safe to put valuable 
articles in windows protected by nothing but a little 
thin pane of glass — which reminds me that in the matter 
of street safety you will be a good deal ahead of us ; 
next, an honest English tradesman loves to keep his 
best out of sight. The streets are horribly noisy. That 
is quite true. You have heard of the roar of the 
mighty city. Your London, Eighty-seven, will not 
know how to roar. But you can now understand what 
its roaring used to be. An intolerable stir and uproar, 
is it not .P But then your ears are not, like ours, used 
to it. First, the road is not macadamised, or asphalted, 
or paved with wood. Next, the trafiic of wagons, carts, 
and wheelbarrows, and hand-carts, is vastly greater 
than you had ever previously imagined ; then there is 
a great deal more of porter work done in the street. 



IN THE STREET 



59 



and the men are perpetually jostling, quarrelling, and 
fighting ; the coaches, those of the short stages with 
two horses, and the long stages with four, are always 
blowing their horns and cracking their whips. Look 
at yonder great wagon. It has come all the way from 
Scotland. It is piled thirty feet high with packages of 
all kinds : baskets hang behind, filled with all kinds of 
things. In front there sit a couple of Scotch lasses 
who have braved a three weeks' journey from Edin- 
burgh in order to save the expense of the coach. Brave 
girls ! But such a wagon with such a load does not go 
along the street in silence. It is not in silence either 
that the women who carry baskets full of fish on their 
heads go along the street, nor is the man silent who goes 
with a pack-donkey loaded on either side with small coal ; 
and the wooden sledge on which is the cask of beer, 
dragged along by a single horse, makes by itself as 
much noise as all your carriages together. Eighty-seven. 
And there is nothing, you observe, for the protec- 
tion and convenience of passengers who wish to cross 
the road. Nothing at all. No pohceman stands in the 
middle of the road to regulate the traffic ; the drivers 
pay no heed to the foot passengers ; at the corner of 
Chancery Lane, where the press is the thickest, the boys 
and the clerks slip in and out among the horses and 
the wheels without hurt : but how will those ladies be 
able to get across? They never would but for the 
crossing-sweeper — the most remunerative part of the 
work, in fact, is to convoy the ladies across the road ; if 



6o 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



he magnifies the danger of this service, and expects 
silver for saving the Uvea of his trembUng chents, who 
shall blame him ? 

There are still left some of the old posts which divided 
the footway from the roadway, though the whole is now 
paved and — what, Eighty-seven ? You have stepped 
into a dandy-trap and splashed your feet. Well, per- 
haps, in your day they will have learned to pave more 

evenly, but just at pre- 
sent our paving is a little 
rough, and the stones 
sometimes small, so that 
here and there, after rain, 
these things will happen. 
Here we are at Black- 
friars. This is the Gate 
of Bridewell, where they 
used to flog women, and 
still flog the 'j^rentices 
Yonder is the Fleet 
Prison, of which we 
have just read an account in the ' Pickwick Papers.' 
They have cleared away the old Fleet Market, which 
used to stand in the middle of the street, and they have 
planted it behind the houses opposite the Prison. Come 
and look at it. Let us tread softly over the stones of 
Farringdon Market, for somewhere beneath our feet lie 
the bones of poor young Chatterton. No monument has 
been erected here to his memory, nor is the spot known 




THOMAS CHATTEKTON 



IN THE STREET 6i 

where he hes, but it is somewhere in this place, which 
is a tragic and mournful spot, being crammed beneath 
its pavement with the bones of the poor, the outcast, 
the broken down, the wrecks and failures of hfe, and 
littered above the pavement with the wreckage and 
refuse of the market. This place was formerly the 
burial-ground of the Shoe Lane Workhouse. 

We can walk down to the Bridge and look at the 
river. No Embankment yet, Eighty-seven. No penny 
steamers, either. Yet the watermen grumble at the 
omnibuses which have cut into their trade. 

Here comes the lamplighter, with his short ladder 
and his lantern. 

Gas, of course, has been introduced for ever so long. 
They have blindly followed the old plan of hghting, 
and have stuck up a gas lamp wherever there used to be 
an oil lantern. The theatres and places of amusement 
are brilHant with gas, and it is gas which makes the 
splendour of the gin-palace. The shops took to it 
slowly, but they are now beginning to understand how 
to brighten their appearance after dark. Go into any 
little thoroughfare, however, and you will see the shops 
lit with two or three candles still. 

In the small houses and the country towns the 
candles linger still. And such candles ! For the most 
part they are tallow : they need constant snuffing : they 
drop their detestable grease everywhere — on the table- 
cloth, on your clothes, on the butter and on the bread. 
You, Eighty-seven, will be saying hard things of gas, but 



62 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

you do not know from what darkness, and misery of 
darkness, it saved your ancestors. 

As for the churches, they are not yet generally pro- 
vided with gas. There is some strange prejudice against 
it in the minds of the clergy. Yet it is not Papistical, 
or even freethinking. In most of them, where they 
have evening service, the pews are provided with two 
candles apiece, stuck in tin candlesticks, with four 
candles for the pulpit and four for the reading-desk. 
The effect is not unpleasing, but the candles continually 
require snuffing, and the operation is constantly attended 
with accidents, so that the church is always filled with 
the fragrance of smouldering tallow wicks. The repug- 
nance to gas is so great, indeed, in some quarters, that 
one clergyman, the Rector of Holy Trinity, Marylebone, 
is going to commit all his vestrymen to the Ecclesiasti- 
cal Courts because they have attempted to light the 
church with gas. 

Here is a City funeral in one of the burial-grounds 
close to the crowded street ; the clergyman reads the 
Service, and the mourners in tlieir long black cloaks 
stand round the open grave, and the coffin is lowered into 
it, and outside there is no cessation at all to the bustle 
and the noise; the wagoner cracks his whip, the drover 
swears at his cattle, the busy men run to and fro as if 
the last rites were not being performed for one who has 
heard the call of the Messenger, and, perforce, obeyed 
it. And look — the mould in which the grave is dug is 
nothing but bits of bones and splinters of coffins. The 



IN THE STREET 



63 



churchyard is no longer a field of clay : it is a field of 
dead citizens. You, friend Eighty-seven, will manage 
these things better. 

Here goes one of the long stages. Saw you ever a 
finer coach, more splendidly appointed, witli better 
cattle? Ten miles an hour that coachman reckons 
upon as soon as he is clear of 
London. They say that in a 
year or two, when all the rail- 
ways are opened, the stage- 
coaches will be ruined, the 
horses all sold, and the English 
breed of horses ruined. We 
shall travel twenty miles an hour 
without stopping to change 
horses ; the accidents will be 
frightful, but those who meet ■ 
with none will get from Lon- 
don to Edinburgh in less than 
twenty-four hours. Next year 
they promise to open the Lon- 
don and Birmingham Eailway. 

Here comes a soldier. You find his dress absurd ? 
To be sure, his tight black stock makes his red cheeks 
seem swollen ; his queer tall hat, with the neat red ball 
at the top, might be more artistic ; the red shoulder roll, 
not the least like an epaulette, would hardly ward off a 
sword-cut ; the coat with its swallow tail is no protec- 
tion to tlie body or the legs ; the whitened belt must 




3rd KEGIILENT OF BUFFS 



64 



FJFTY YEARS AGO 



cost an infinite amount of trouble to keep it fit for 
inspection, and a working-man's breeches and stockings 
would be more serviceable than those long trousers. 
There are always brave fellows, however, ready to en- 
list ; the soldier's life is attractive, though the discipline 
is hard and the floggings are truly awful. 




DOUGLAS JEBEOLD 
( From the Bust by the late E. H. Bailey, R.A.) 



My friend, it is half-past five, and you are tired. 
Let us get back to Temple Bar and dine at the Mitre, 
where we can take our cut off the joint for eighteen- 
pence. About this time most men are thinking of 
dinner. Buy an evening paper of the boy. 



IN THE STREET 



65 



So : this is cosy. A newly sanded floor, a bright 
fire, and a goodly company. James ! a clean table- 
cloth, a couple of candles, and the snuffers, and the last 
joint up. What have you got in the paper? Mada- 
gascar Embassy, Massacre in New Zealand — where the 
devil is New Zealand ? — Suicide of Champion, who made 
the infernal machine, Great Distress in the Highlands, 
Murder of a Process-server 
in Ireland, Crossing of the 
Channel in a Balloon — I 
hope that some day an 
army may not cross it — 
Letter from Syria, con- 
cernins; the recent Great 
Earthquake, Conduct of 
the British Legion in Spain, 
Seven Men imprisoned for 
unlawfully ringing the 
Bells, Death of the Oldest 
Woman in the World, aged 
162 years, said to have 
been the Nurse of George 

Washington — a good deal of news all for one evening 
paper. Hush ! we are in luck. Here is Douglas 
Jerrold. Now we shall hear something good. Here 
is Leigh Hunt, and here is Forster, and here — ah ! this 
is unexpected — here comes none other than ' Boz ' him- 
self. Of course you know his name .^ It is Charles 
Dickens. Saw one ever a brighter eye or a more self- 




JOHN FORSTEB 
(From a Photograph by Elliott and Fry) 



66 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



reliant bearing ? Such self-reliance belongs to those 
who are about to succeed. They say his fortune is 
already made, though but yesterday he was a reporter 
in the House, taking down the speeches in shorthand. 
Who is that tall young man with the ugly nose ? Only 
a journalist. They say he wrote that funny paper 
called ' The Fatal Boots ' in TiUs Annual. His name is 
Thackeray, I believe, but I know nothing more about 
him. 

Here comes dinner, with a tankard of foaming stout. 
Is there any other drink quite so good as stout ? After 
you have taken your dinner, friend Eighty-seven, 1 shall 

prescribe for you what you 
will never get, poor wretch 
— a bottle of the best port 
in the cellars of tlie Mitre. 
My friend, there is one 
thing in which we of the 
Thirties do greatly excel 
you of the Eighties. We 
can eat like ploughboys, 
and we can drink like dray- 
men. As for your nonsense 
about Apolhnaris Water, 
we do not know what it 
means ; and as for your not being able to take a simple 
o-lass of port, we do not in the least understand it. 
Not take a pint of port ? Man alive ! we can take two 
bottles, and never turn a hair. 




CHABLES DICKENS 



CHAPTER y. 

WITH THE PEOPLE. 

When the real history of the people comes to be written 
— which will be the History, not of the Higher, but of 
the Lower Forms of Civilisation — it w^ill be found that, 
as regards the people of these islands, they sank to their 
lowest point of degradation and corruption in the middle 
of the eighteenth century — a period when they had no 
religion, no morality, no education, and no knowledge, 
and when they were devoured by two dreadful diseases, 
and were prematurely killed by their excessive drinking 
of gin. No virtue at all seems to have survived among 
all the many virtues attributed to our race except a 
bulldog courage and tenacity. There are glimpses here 
and there, when some essayist or novelist lifts the veil, 
which show conditions of existence so shockingp that 
one asks in amazement how there could have been any 
cheerfulness in the civilised part of the community for 
thinking of the terrible creatures in the ranks below. 
They did not think of them ; they did not know of them ; 
to us it seems as if the roaring of that volcano must 
have been always in their ears, and the smoke of it 



68 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

always choking their throats. But our people saw and 
heard nothing. Across the Channel, where men's eyes 
were quicker to see, the danger was clearly discerned, 
and the eruption foretold. Here, no one saw anything, 
or feared anything. 

How this country got through without a revolution, 
how it escaped the dangers of that mob, are questions 
more difficult to answer than the one which continually 
occupies historians — How Great Britain, single-handed, 
fought against the conqueror of the world. Both vic- 
tories were mainly achieved, I beheve, by the might and 
majesty of Father Stick. 

He is dead now, and will rule no more in this 
country. But all through the last century, and well 
into this, he was more than a king — he was a despot, 
relentless, terrible. He stripped women to the waist 
and whipped them at Bridewell ; he caught the 'pren- 
tices and flogged them soundly ; he lashed the criminal 
at the cart-tail ; he laslied the slaves in the plantations, 
the soldiers in the army, the sailors on board the 
ships, and the boys at school. He kept everybody in 
order, and, truly, if the old violence were to return, we 
might have to call in Father Stick again. 

He was good up to a certain point, beyond which 
he could not go. He could threaten, ' If you do this, 
and this, you shall be trounced.' Thus the way of 
transgressors was made visibly hard for them. But he 
could not educate — he taught nothing except obedience 
to the law ; he had neither religion nor morals ; there- 



WITH THE PEOPLE 69 

fore, though he kept the people in order, he did not 
advance them. On the other hand, under his rule they 
were left entirely to themselves, and so they grew worse 
and worse, more thirsty of gin, more brutal, more 
ignorant. So that, in the long run, I suppose there 
was not under the light of the sun a more depraved and 
degraded race than that which peopled the lowest levels 
of our great towns. There is always in every great 
town a big lump of lawlessness, idleness, and hostility 
to order. The danger, a hundred years ago, was that 
this lump was getting every day bigger, and threatening 
to include the whole of the working class. 

Eemember that as yet the government of this realm 
was wholly in the hands of the wealthier sort. Only 
those who had what was humorously called a stake in 
the country were allowed to share in ruling it. Those 
who brought tp the service of their native land only 
their hands and their lives, their courage, their patience, 
skill, endurance, and obedience, were supposed to have 
no stake in the country. The workers, who contribute 
the whole that makes the prosperity of the country, 
were then excluded from any share in managing it. 

It seems to me that the first improvement of the 
People dates from their perception of the fact that all 
have a right to help in managing their own affairs; I 
think one might prove that the ideas of the French 
Eevolution, when they were once grasped, arrested the 
downward course of the People — the first step to dig- 
nity and self-respect was to understand that they might 



70 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

become free men, and not remain like unto slaves who 
are ordered and have to obey. Then they began to 
struggle for their rights, and in the struggle learned a 
thousand lessons which have stood them in o:ood stead. 
They learned to combine, to act together, to form com- 
mittees and councils ; they learned the art of oratory, 
and the arts of persuasion by speech and pen ; they 
learned the power of knowledge — in a word, the long 
struggle whose first great victory was the Eeform Act 
of 1832 taught the People the art of self-government. 

Fifty years ago, though that Act had been passed, 
the great mass of the people were still outside the 
government. They were governed by a class who de- 
sired, on the whole, to be just, and wished well to the 
people, provided their own interests were not disturbed, 
as when the most philanthropic manufacturers loudly 
cried out as soon as it was proposed to restrict the 
hours of labour. It is not wonderful, therefore, that 
the workincf classes should at that time re(?ard all 
governments with hostility, and Eeligion and Laws as 
chiefly intended to repress the workers and to safeguard 
the interests of landlords and capitalists. This fact is 
abundantly clear from the literature which the working 
men of 1837 dehghted to read. 

As regards their religion, there was already an im- 
mense advance in the spread of the Nonconformist sects 
and the multiplication of chapels. As for the churches, I 
am very certain that the working man does not go much 
to church even yet, but fifty years ago he attended ser- 



WITH THE PEOPLE 71 

vice still less often. A contemporary who pretends to 
know asserts that nine out of ten among the working 
men were professed infidels, whose favourite feading 
was Paine, Carlile, and Eobert Taylor, the author of 
'The Devil's Chaplain.' Further, he declares that not 
one working man in a hundred ever opened a Bible. 

T refrain from dwelling upon this state of things as 
compared with that of the present, but it appears from 
a census taken by a recent weekly newspaper (which, 
however, omitted the mission churches and services in 
school-rooms and other places) that about one person 
in nine now attends church or chapel on a Sunday. 

As regards drink, a question almost as delicate as 
that of religion, it is reported that in London alone 
three millions of pounds were spent every year in gin, 
which seems a good deal of money to throw away with 
nothing to show for it. But figures are always misleading. 
Thus, if everybody drank his fair share of this three 
millions, there would be only a single glass of gin every 
other day for every person ; and if half the people did, 
not drink at all, there would be only one glass of gin a 
day for those who did. Still, we must admit that three 
millions is a sum which shows a widespread love of gin. 
As for rum, brandy, and Hollands, the various forms of 
malt liquor, fancy drinks, and compounds, let us reserve 
ourselves for the chapter on Taverns. Suffice it here 
to call attention to the fact that there was no blue 
ribbon worn. Teetotallers there were, it is true, but in 
very small numbers ; they were not yet a power in the 



72 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

land ; there was none of the everlasting dinning about 
the plague spot, the national vice, and the curse of the 
age, to which we are now accustomed. Honest men 
indulged in a bout without subsequent remorse, and so 
long as the drink was unadulterated they did themselves 
little harm. Without doubt, if the men had become 
teetotallers, there would have been very much more to 
spend in the homes, and the employers would, also with- 
out doubt, have made every effort to reduce the wages 
accordingly, so as to keep up the old poverty. That is 
what the former school of philosophers called a Law of 
Political Economy. The wages of a skilled mechanic 
fifty years ago seem to have never risen above thirty 
shillings a week, while food, clothes, and necessaries 
were certainly much dearer than at present. He had 
savings banks, and he sometimes put something by, but 
not nearly so much as he can do now if he is thrifty 
and in regular work. It is quite clear that he was less 
thrifty in those days than now, that he drank more, 
and that he was even more reckless, if that is possible, 
about marriage and the multiplication of children. 

As for the material condition of the people, there 
cannot be a doubt that it has been amazingly improved 
within the last fifty years. It is not true, as stated in 
a very well known work, that the poor have become 
poorer, though the rich have certainly become richer. 
The skilled working man is better paid now than then, 
his work is more steady, his hours are shorter. He is 
better clad, with always a suit of clothes apart from 



WITH THE PEOPLE 73 

his working dress ; he is better taught ; he is better 
mannered ; he has holidays ; he has clubs ; he is no 
longer forbidden to combine ; he can co-operate ; he 
holds meetings ; he has much better newspapers to 
read ; his food is better and cheaper ; he has model 
lodging houses. Not only is he actually better ; he is 
relatively better compared with the richer classes, while 
for the last ten years these have been growing poorer 
every day, although still much richer than they were 
fifty years ago. Moreover, it is becoming more difficult 
in every line, owing to the upward pressure of labour, 
to become rich. 

His amusements no longer have the same brutality 
which used to characterise them. The Eing was his 
chief delight, and a well-fought battle between two ac- 
complished bruisers caused his heart to leap with joy. 
Unhappily the Ring fell, not because the national senti- 
ment concerning pugilism changed, but by its own 
vices, and because nearly every fight was a fight on 
the cross ; so that betting on your man was no longer 
possible, and every victory was arranged beforehand. 
There are now signs of its revival, and if it can be in 
any way regulated it will be a very good thing for the 
country. Then there was dog-fighting, which is still 
carried on in certain parts of the country. Only a 
few years ago I saw a dozen dog-fights, eacli with its 
ring of eager lookers-on, one Sunday morning upon the 
sands between Eedcar and Saltburn. All round London, 
again, there were ponds, quantities of ponds, all marked 



74 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

in the maps of the period and now all filled up and built 
over. Some, for instance, were in the fields on the east 
side of Tottenham Court Eoad. Hither, on Sundays, 
came the London working man with ducks, cats, and 
dogs, and proceeded to enjoy himself with cat-hunts and 
duck-hunts in these ponds. There were also bull-and- 
bear-baitings and badger-drawings. As for the fairs, 
Bartholomew and Greenwich, one is sorry that they had 
to be abolished, but I suppose that London had long 
been too big for a fair, which may be crowded but must 
not be mobbed. A real old fair, with rows of stalls 
crammed with all kinds of things which looked ever 
80 much prettier under the flaring lamps than in the 
shops, with Richardson's Theatre, the Wild Beast Show, 
the wrestlers and the cudgel-players, the boxers, with 
or without the gloves, the dwarfs, giants, fat women, 
bearded women, and monsters, was a truly delightful 
thing to the rustics in the country ; but in London it 
was incongruous, and even in Arcadia a modern fair 
is apt to lose its picturesque aspect towards nightfall. 
On the whole, it is just as well for London that it has 
lost its ancient fairs. 

It is not in connection with working men, but with 
the whole people, that one speaks of prisons. I do not 
think that our prison system at the present day is every 
thing that it might be. There have been one or two books 
published of late years, which make one uncomfortable 
in thinking of the poor wretches immured in these 
abodes of solitary suffering. Still, if one lias to choose 



WITH THE PEOPLE 75 

between a lonely cell and the society of the prison birds 
by day and night, one would prefer the former. Some at- 
tempts had been made in Newgate and elsewhere to pre- 
vent the prisoners from corrupting each other, but with 
small success. Those who were tried and sentenced 
were separated from those who were waiting their trial; 
the boys were separated from the men, the girls from 
the women. Yet the results of being committed to 
prison, for however short a period, were destructive of all 
morals and the last shred of principle. Not a single girl 
or woman who went into prison modest and virtuous but 
became straightway ashamed of her modesty and virtue, 
and came out of the prison already an abandoned 
woman. Not a man or boy who associated with the 
prisoners for a week but became a past master in all 
kinds of wickedness. In the night rooms they used to 
lock up fifteen or twenty prisoners together, and leave 
them there all night to interchange their experiences — 
and what experiences ! Only those who were under 
sentence of death had separate cells. These poor 
wretches were put into narrow and dark rooms, re- 
ceiving light only from the court in which the criminals 
are permitted to walk during the day. They slept on 
a mat, and in former days had but twenty-four hours 
between sentence and execution, with bread and water 
for all their food. 

Transportation still went on, with the horrors of the 
convict ship, the convict hulks, and the convict esta- 
blishments of New South Wales and Tasmania. The 
8 



76 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



' horrors ' of the system have always seemed to me 
as formmg an unessential part of the system. With 
better management on modern ideas, transportation 
shoidd be far better than the present system of hope- 
less punishment by long periods of imprisonment. We 
can never return to transportation as far as any colony 
is concerned, but I venture to prophesy that the next 
change of the penal laws will be the re-establishment ol 
transportation with the prospect of release, a gift ol 
land, and a better chance for an honest life. 

Meantime the following lines belong to Fifty Years 
Ago. They are the Farewell of convicts about to sail 
for Botany Bay : 

THE DARBY DAY. 




Come, Bet, my pet, and Sal, my pal, a buss, and then farewell — 
And Ned, the primest ruffling cove that ever nail'd a swell — 
To share the swag, or chaff the gab, we'll never meet again, 
The hulks is now my bowsing crib, the hold my dossing ken. 
Don't nab the bib, my Bet, this chance must happen soon or later. 
For certain sure it is that transportation comes by natur ; 
His lordship's self, upon the bench, co downie his white wig in. 
Might sail with me, if friends had he to bring him up to priggin ; 
And is it not unkimmon fly in them as rules the nation. 
To make us end, with Botany, our public edication 1 
But vSal, so kind, be sure you mind the beaks don't catch you tripping. 
You'll find it hard to be for shopping sent on board the shipping : 
So tip your mauns afore we parts, don't blear your eyes and nose. 
Another grip, my jolly hearts — here's luck, and off we goes I 



WITH THE PEOPLE 



77 



Debtors' prisons were in full swing. There were 
Whitecross Street Prison, built in 1813 for the exclusive 
reception of debtors, who were before this crowded 
together with criminals at Newgate ; Queen's Bench Pri- 
son, the Fleet, and the Marshalsea. The King's Bench 
Prison was the largest, and, so to speak, the most 




NEWGATE — ENTKANCE IN THE OLD BAILEY 



fashionable of these prisons. Both at the King's Bench 
and the Fleet debtors were allowed to purchase what 
were called the ' Rules,' which enabled them to live 
within a certain area outside the prison, and practically 
left them free. They paid a certain percentage on their 



78 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

debts. This practice enabled the debtor to refuse 
paying his debts, and to save his money for himself or 
his heirs. Lodgings, however, within the Rules were 
bad and expensive. 

There was no national compulsory system of edu- 
cation ; yet the children of respectable working men 
were sent to school. The children of the very poor, 
those who lived from hand to mouth by day jobs, by 
chance and luck, were not taught anything. If you 
talk to a working man of sixty or thereabouts, you will 
most likely discover that he can read, though he has 
very often forgotten how to write. He was taught 
when he was a child at the schools of the National 
Society, or at those of the British and Foreign Society, or 
at the parish schools, of which there were a great many. 
There were also many thousands of children who went 
to the Sunday School. Yet, partly through the neglect 
of parents, and partly through the demand for children's 
labour in the factories, nearly a half of the children in 
the country grew up without any schooling. In 1837 
there were forty per cent, of the men and sixty-five per 
cent, of the women who could not sign their own names. 

And there were already effected, or just about to 
be effected, three immense reforms, the like of which 
the nation had never seen before, which are together 
working for a Ee volution of Peace, not of war, greater 
than contemplated by the most sincere and most disin- 
terested of the French Revolutionaries. 

The first was the Reform of the Penal Laws. 



WITH THE PEOPLE 



79 



In the beginning of the century the law recognised 
223 capital offences. A man might be hanged for 
almost anything : if he appeared in disguise on a 
public road ; if he cut down young trees ; if he shot 
rabbits ; if he poached at night ; if he stole anything 
worth five shillings from a person or a shop ; if he 
came back from transportation before his time ; a gipsy, 
if he remained in the same place a year. In fact, the 
chief desire of the Government was to get rid of the 
criminal classes by hanging them. It was Sir Samuel 
Romilly, as everybody knows, who first began to attack 
this bloodthirsty code. 
He was assisted by the 
growth of public opinion 
and by the juries, who 
practically repealed the 
laws by refusing to con- 
vict. 

It was not, again, 
until the year 1836 that 
counsel for a prisoner 
under trial for felony was 
permitted to address the 
jury. In the year 1834, 

there were 480 death sentences ; in 1838, only 116. In 
1834, 894 persons were sentenced to transportation for 
life, and in 1838 only 266. Eemember that this wicked 
severity only served to enlist the sympathies of the 
people against the Government. 




IN THE queen's BENCH 



8o FIFTY YEARS AGO 

The second great step was the repeal of the Acts 
which forbade combination. Until the year 1820, the 
people had been forbidden to combine. Their only power 
against employers who worked them as many hours a 
day as they dared, and paid them wages as small as 
they could, who took their children and locked them 
up in unwholesome factories, was in combination, and 
they were forbidden to combine. When the law — an 
old medieval law — was repealed, it was found that any 
attempt to hold public meetings might be put down by 
force ; so that, though they could not combine, the 
chief means of promoting combination was taken from 
them. 

The third great step was the Extension of the 
Suffrage, so that now there is no Briton or Irishman 
but can, if he please, have his vote in the govern- 
ment of the nation. It is not a great share which is 
conferred by one vote, but it enables every man to feel 
that he is himself a part of the nation ; that the govern- 
ment is not imposed upon him, but elected and ap- 
proved by himself. 

Considering all these things, have we any reason to 
be surprised when we learn that, on the Queen's Acces- 
sion, there was among the people no loyalty whatever ? 
Attachment to the Sovereign, personal devotion to the 
young Queen, rallying round the Throne — all these 
things were not even phrases to the working class. For 
they never heard them used. 

There was no loyalty at all, either to the Queen, or to 



WITH THE PEOPLE 8i 

the institution of a limited Monarchy^ or to the Constitu- 
tion^ or to the Church. 

For a hundred and fifty years there had been no 
loyalty among the people. Loyalty left tlie country 
with James II. Not one of the Sovereigns who fol- 
lowed him commanded the personal enthusiasm of the 
people, not even Farmer George, for whom there had 
been some kind of affection with something of contempt. 
From 1687 until 1837, which is exactly one hundred 
and fifty years, not one Sovereign who sat upon the 
Throne of England could boast that he had the love of 
the people. Not one wished to have the love of the 
people. He represented a principle : he governed with 
the assistance of a few families and by the votes of a 
small class. As King he was a stranger. When he drove 
through the streets, the people hurrahed ; but they did 
not know him, and they cared nothing for him. 

Therefore the sentiment of loyalty had to be re-born. 
It could only be awakened by a woman, young, vir- 
tuous, naturally amiable, and resolved on ruling by con- 
stitutional methods. Yet in some of the journals written 
for, and read by, the working men, the things said con- 
cerning the Queen, the Prince Consort, and the Court 
were simply horrible and disgusting. Such things are 
no longer said. There are still papers which speak of 
the aristocracy as a collection of titled profligates, and 
of the clergy as a crowd of pampered hypocrites, but 
of the Queen it is rare indeed to find mention other 
than is respectful. Her life and example for fifty years 



82 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

have silenced the slanderers. It has been found once 
more possible for a Sovereign to possess the love of 
her people. 

The papers read by the working men were not only 
scurrilous, but they were Eepublican and revolutionary. 
The Eepublic whose example they set before themselves 
was not the American, which is Conservative, for of this 
they knew nothing. Let us clearly understand this. Fifty 
years ago America was far more widely separated from 
England than is China now. The ideal Eepublic was then 
the earlier form of the first French Eepublic. These 
people cared httle for the massacres which accompanied 
the application of Eepublican principles. I do not say 
that they wished to set the heads of the Queen's Ladies- 
in- Waiting on pikes, but they thought the massacres of 
innocent women by the French an accident rather than 
a consequence. They loved the cry of 'Liberty, 
Equahty, and Fraternity,' and still beheved in it. They 
dreamed of a country which they thought could be 
established by law, in which every man was to be the 
equal of his neighbour — as clever, as skilful, as capable, 
as rich, and as happy. The dream continues, and will 
always continue, to exist. It is a generous dream — 
there never has been a nobler dream — so that it is a 
thousand pities that human greed, selfishness, ambi- 
tion, and masterfulness will not sufier the dream to be 
realised. Those who advocated an attempt to realise 
it flung hard names at the Crown, the Court, the aris- 
tocracy, the Church, the educated, and the wealthy. 



WITH THE PEOPLE 83 

Presently they began to formulate the way by which 
they thought to place themselves within reach of their 
object. The way was Chartism. They wanted to 
carry six measures — Universal Suffrage, Annual Parlia- 
ments, Vote by Ballot, Abolition of Property Quali- 
fication, Payment of Members, and Equal Electoral 
Districts. Very well ; we have got, practically, four 
out of the six points, and there are many who think 
that we are as far off the Millennium as ever. Yet 
there are, however, still among us people who believe 
that we can be made happy, just, merciful, and dis- 
interested by changing the machinery. Changing the 
machinery ! The old party of Radicals still work them- 
selves into a white heat by crying for change in the 
machinery. 

And now a thing which was never contemplated 
even by the Chartists themselves — the really important 
thing — has been acquired by the people. They are no 
longer the governed, but the governors. The Govern- 
ment is no longer a thing apart from themselves, and 
outside them. It is their own — it is the Government of 
the People of England. If there is anything in it 
which they do not like, they can alter it ; if there is 
anything they agree to abolish, they can abolish it, 
whether it be Church, Crown, Lords, wealth, education, 
science, art — anything. They may destroy what they 
please : they may reduce the English to an illiterate 
peasantry if they please. 

They will not please. I, for one, have the greatest 



84 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

confidence in the justice, the common-sense, and the 
Conservatism of the English and the Scotch. The 
people do not, as yet, half understand their own power ; 
while they are gradually growing to comprehend it, 
they will be learning the history of their country, the 
duties and responsibilities of citizenship, the dangers of 
revolution, and the advantages of those old institutions 
by whose aid the whole world has been covered with 
those who speak the Anglo-Saxon speech and are 
governed by the English law. 

My friends, we are changed indeed. Fifty years 
ago we were, as I have said, stUl in the eighteenth 
century. The people had no power, no knowledge, no 
voice ; they were the slaves of their employers ; they 
were brutish and ill-conditioned, ready to rebel against 
their rulers, but not knowing how ; chafing under laws 
which they did not make, and restraints which kept 
them from acting together, or from meeting to ask if 
things must always continue so. We are changed 
indeed. 

We now stand upright ; our faces are full of hope, 
though we are oppressed by doubts and questions, 
because we know not which path, of the many before 
us, will be the wisest ; the future is all our own ; we 
are no longer the servants ; we are the Masters, the 
absolute Eulers, of the greatest Empire that the world 
has ever seen. 

God grant that we govern it with wisdom I 



CHAPTER VI. 

WITH THE MIDDLE-CLASS. 

The great middle- class — supposed, before the advent 
of IMr. Matthew Arnold, to possess all the virtues ; to 
be the backbone, stay, and prop of the country— -must 
have a chapter to itself. 

In the first place, the middle-class was far more a 
class apart than it is at present. In no sense did it 
belong to society. Men in professions of any kind, 
except the two services, could only belong to society 
by right of birth and family connections ; men in trade 
— bankers were still accounted tradesmen — could not 
possibly belong to society. That is to say, if they went 
to hve in the country they were not called upon by 
the county families, and in town they were not ad- 
mitted by the men into their clubs, or by ladies into 
their houses. Those circles, of which there are now 
so many — artistic, aesthetic, Uterary — all of them con- 
sidering themselves to belong to society, were then out 
of society altogether ; nor did they overlap and inter- 
sect each other. The middle-class knew its own place, 
respected itself, made its own society for itself, and 



86 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



cheerfully accorded to rank its reverence due. The 
annals of the poor are meagre ; only here and there 
one gets a glimpse into their lives. But the middle- 
class is much better known, because it has had pro- 
phets ; nearly all the poets, novelists, essayists, jour- 
nalists, and artists have sprung from it. Tliose who 
adorned the Thirties and the Forties — Hood, Hook, Gait, 
Dickens, Albert Smith, Thackeray — all belonged to it ; 
George Eliot, wdiose country towns are those of the 

Thirties and the Forties, was 
essentially a woman of the 
middle-class. 

Middle- class life — espe- 
cially in the country — was 
dull, far, far duller than 
modern life even in the 
quietest country town. The 
men had their business; the 
women had the house. In- 
comes ran small ; a great 
deal was done at home that 
is now done out of it. There was a weekly washing- 
day, when the house steamed with hot soap-suds, and 
the ' lines' were out upon the poles — they were painted 
green and were square — and on the lines hung half the 
family linen. All the jam was made at home ; the cakes, 
the pies, and the puddings, by the wife and daughters ; 
the bread was home-made ; the beer was home-brewed 
(and better beer than good home-brewed no man need 




GEOEGK ELIOT 

(Taken from the Drawing iu ' The Graphic ' 
by permission) 



WITH THE MIDDLE-CLASS 87 

desire) ; all those garments which are not worn outside 
were made at home. Everybody dined in the middle 
of the day. Therefore, in the society of the country 
town dinner-parties did not exist. On the other hand, 
there were sociable evening's, which besjan with a sit- 
down tea, with mulBns and tea-cakes, very delightful, 
and ended with a hot supper. Tobacco was not ad- 
mitted in any shape except that of snuff into the better 
kind of middle-class house ; only working men smoked 
vulgar pipes ; the Sabbath was respected ; there was 
no theatre nearer than the county town ; the girls 
had probably never seen a play ; every man who 
respected himself ' laid down ' port, but there was little 
drinking of wine except on Sunday afternoons ; no one, 
not even the ladies, scorned the glass of something 
warm, with a spoon in it, after supper. For the young 
there was a fair once a year ; now and then a travelling 
circus came along ; there was a lecture occasionally on 
an instructive subject, such as chemistry, or astronomy, 
or sculpture ; there were picnics, but these were rare ; 
if there were show places in the neighbourhood, parties 
were made to them, and tea was festively taken among 
the ruins of the Abbey. 

Fashion descends slowly ; it is now the working 
man who takes his wife into the country for tea : fifty 
years ago he took his wife nowhere, and scorned tea. 
Open-air games and sports there were none ; no lawn- 
tennis. Badminton, or anything of that kind in those 
days ; even croquet, which is now so far lost in the 



88 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

mists of antiquity that men of thirty are too young to 
remember the rage for it, was actually not yet invented. 
Archery certainly existed, and the comic writers are 
always drawing pictures of the young ladies sticking 
their arrows into the legs of people a hundred feet or 
so wide of the target. But archery belonged to a class 
rather above that which we are now considering. 
There was not much sketching and painting. There 
was no amateur photography ; there was no catching 
of strange creatures in ponds for the aquarium — a 
fashion also now happily extinct ; there was not, in 
fact, any single pursuit, amusement, or game which 
would bring young people together in the open air. 
There was no travelling ; the summer holiday had not 
yet got down in the country. In London, to be sure, 
everybody down to Bevis Marks and Simmery Axe 
went out of town and to the seaside in July or August ; 
but in the country nobody thought of such a thing ; 
not the vicar's daughters, not the solicitor's wife, not 
the family of the general practitioner ; the very school- 
master, who got his four weeks in the summer and his 
three at Christmas, spent them at home in such joy 
as accompanies rest from labour. With no outdoor 
amusements, and with no summer holiday, how much 
is life simphfied ! But the simplicity of life means 
monotony — -faciunt vitam^ balnea, vma, Venus. 

In the winter, things were somewhat different. In 
some towns there was the county ball. At this func- 
tion one had the pleasure of gazing upon ladies and 



WITH THE MIDDLE-CLASS 



89 



gentlemen of tlie highest rank and fashion, and of ob- 
serving that they kept to themselves like a Hindu caste, 
danced with each other at the upper end of the room, 
cast disparaging glances at the dresses of tlie ladies of 
the lower end, and sniffed at their manner and appear- 
ance. This was true joy. There were also occasional 
dances at home, but these were rare, because people 
had not learned how to meet and dance without makinjr 
a fuss over it, taking up carpets, putting candles in tin 




liA PASTOURELLE 



sconces, keeping late hours, and having a supper, the 
preparation of which was mainly done by the ladies of 
the house, and it nearly killed them, and drove the 
servants — tlie genteel middle-class family often got 
along with only one — to give notice. I think that the 
dances which had gone out in London still lingered in 
the country. There were, for instance, the Caledonians 
as well as the Lancers ; there were country dances with- 
out end, the very names of which are now lost ; the 
gentlemen performed the proper steps with grace and 



90 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

agility, while the ladies were careful to preserve an 
attitude supposed the only one possible for a lady 
while dancing, in which the figure was bent forward, 
the face was turned up with the chin stuck out, while 
the hands were occupied in holding up the dress to the 
regulation height. The elders, meanwhile, played long 
whist at tables lit by candles which wanted snufRng 
between the deals. The bashful youth of the party 
was always covering himself with shame by his clumsi- 
ness in snuffing out the candles, or, even if he succeeded 
in taking off the red-hot ball of burnt thread, he too 
often neglected to close the instrument with which he 
effected the operation, and thereby mightily offended 
the nostrils of the company. When there was no 
dancing the younger members began with a 'little 
music' Their songs— how faded and stale they seem 
now if one tries to sing them ! — turned chiefly on the 
affections, and the favourite poet was Felicia Hemans. 
After the little music they sat down to a round game, 
of which there were a great many, such as Commerce, 
Speculation, Yingt-et-Un, Limited Loo, or Pope Joan. 
The last was played with a board. I remember the 
board — it was a round thing, lacquered, and like a 
punch-bowl, but I think with divisions ; as for the 
game itself, and what was done with the board, I quite 
forget, but both game and bowl lasted quite into the 
Fifties. Are there any country circles now where they 
still play Pope Joan with mother-o'-pearl counters, and 
after the game have a grand settlement, and exchange 



WITH THE MIDDLE-CLASS 91 

the counters for silver and copper, some with chuckles, 
and others with outward smiles but inward ra!:i:e ? 

People were extremely punctilious on the subject of 
calls — one remembers the call in the ' Mill on the Floss.' 
The call was due at regular intervals, so that even the 
day should almost be known on which it was paid or 
returned. It was a ceremonial which necessitated a 
great deal of ritual and make-believe. No one, for 
instance, was to be surprised in doing any kind of 
work. There was a fiction in genteel families that the 
ladies of the house never did anything serious or 
serviceable after dinner ; the afternoon was supposed 
to be devoted either to walking, or to making calls, or 
to elegant trifling at home. Therefore, if the girls were 
at the moment engaged upon any useful work — many 
of them, poor things, never did anything but useful 
work — they crammed it under the sofa, and pretended 
to be reading a book, or painting, or knitting, or to be 
engaged in easy and fashionable conversation. Why 
they went through this elaborate pretence I have not 
the least idea, because everybody knew that every girl 
in the place was always making, mending, cutting- out, 
basting, gusseting, trimming, turning, and contriving. 
Ilowdoyou suppose that the solicitor's daughters made 
so brave a show on Sundays if they were not clever 
enough to make up things for themselves ? Everybody, 
of course, knew it, and why the girls would not own up 
at once one cannot now understand. Perhaps it was a 
sort of suspicion, or a faint hope, or a wild dream. 



92 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

that a reputation for ladylike uselessness might enable 
them to cross the line at the County Ball, and mingle 
with the county people. 

Are there still any circles of society in which, if a 
lady with her daughters calls upon another lady with 
her daughters, the decanters, biscuits, and glasses are 
placed upon the table, and the visitors are asked whether 
they will take port or sherry ? This, fifty years ago, 
was always done in country towns, and the visitors 
always took a glass of port or sherry. In some houses 
it was not port and sherry that were placed upon the 
table, but ' red ' and ' white.' I do not know whether 
the red was currant or raspberry, but I think that the 
white was generally cowslip. When the visitors were 
gone, the ladies got out their work again, threaded 
their needles, and spent an enjoyable hour or two in 
discussing the appearance, the dress, the manners, and 
the resources of their visitors. But the visit did them 
good, because it compelled company manners, which 
are always good for girls, and it dragged them a little 
out of themselves. They were too much en famille, 
these girls ; they were never separated from each other. 
The boys got out to school or to business all day ; but 
the poor girls were always together. Side by side they 
did their household duties, side by side they sewed and 
dressmaked, side by side they walked, side by side they 
prayed in the church, side by side they slept. Small 
chance of happiness was theirs — happiness is a separate, 
distinct, individual kind of thing, in which one can con- 



WITH THE MIDDLE-CLASS 93 

suit one's own likes — until, in the fulness of time, there 
came along the lover — a humdrum, commonplace kind 
of lover, I dare say, but his sweetheart was as common- 
place as himself — and she exchanged a house, where 
she was a better kind of servant, for one of exactly the 
same sort, in which she was the mistress. And when 
one says mistress, it must be remembered that man was, 
in those days, much more of a master in the house than 
he is now allowed to be. I speak not at random, but 
from the evidence of those who remember and from 
study of the literature, both that written by the men 
and that by the women. I am cercain that the husband, 
unless he was hen-pecked — a pleasing word, now seldom 
used — was always the Master and generally the Tyrant 
in the house. 

Let me, with some diffidence, approach the subject 
of the Church in the country town. I never truly 
understood the Church of fifty years ago until, in the 
autumn of 1885, 1 perambulated with one who is jealous 
for Church architecture and Church antiquities the 
north-east corner of Norfolk, where there are many 
churches, and most of them are fine. In our pilgrimage 
among these monuments we presently came upon one 
at the aspect of which we were fain to sit down and 
weep. It was, externally, an old and venerable structure, 
which might have been made beautiful within. Plaster 
covered the walls, and hid the columns ; the interior of 
the church was crowded with high pews, painted white, 

and having along the top a sham mahogany kind of 

9* 



94 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

liand-raR ; the chancel was encumbered with these en- 
closures, which hid the old brass- work ; that which 
belonged to the Squire was provided with red curtains 
on brass rods to keep the common people from gazing 
at the Quality. The reading-desk, pulpit, and altar were 
covered with a cloth which had been red, but had long 
before faded away into an indescribably shabby brown. 
The pulpit was not part of the old three-decker, but 
was stuck into the wall ; the windows had lost their 
old tracery ; the painted glass was gone ; the roof was 
a flat whitewashed ceiling. The church, to eyes accus- 
tomed to better things, presented a deplorable appear- 
ance. My friend, pointing solemnly to the general 
shabbiness, remarked, ' Donee templa refeceris.'' It was 
the motto of the journal started early in the Forties by 
a small knot of Cambridge men — among whom was 
Mr. Beresford Hope, now, alas ! no more — who desired 
to raise and beautify public worship in the Anglican 
faith, and also, I believe, to assert and insist upon 
certain points of doctrine. And they clearly perceived 
that, while the churches remained in their neglected 
condition, and chnrch architecture was at its then low 
ebb, their doctrine was impossible. How far they have 
succeeded not only the Eitualists themselves proclaim, 
but also every other party in the Church, and even the 
Nonconformists, who have shared in the increased 
beauty and fitcess of public w^orship. 

He who can remember the ordinary Church Services 
in the early Fifties very well knows what they were in 



WITH THE MIDDLE-CLASS 95 

the Thirties, except that in the latter there were still 
some venerable divines who wore a wig. 

The musical part of the service was, to begin with, 
taken slow — incredibly slow; no one now would, who 
is not old enough to remember, beheve how slow it 
was. The voluntary at the beginning was a slow 
rumble ; the Psalms were very slowly read by the 
clergyman and the clerk alternately, the Gloria alone 
beincr sung, also to a slow rumble. The choir was 
generally stationed in the organ loft, which has been 
known to be built over the altar at the east end — as at 
St. Mary's, Cambridge — but was generally at the west 
end. It was not a choir of boys and men only, but of 
women and men. The ' Te Deum' was always 'Jackson' 
— from my youth up have I loathed ' Jackson ' ; there 
was just one hvely bit in it for which one looked and 
waited ; but it lasted a very few bars ; and then the 
thing dragged on more slowly than ever till it came to 
the welcome words, 'Let me never be confounded.' 
Two hymns were sung — very slowly ; they were always 
of the kind which expressed either the despair of the 
sinner or the doubtful joy of the behever. I say 
doubtful, because he was constantly being warned not 
to be too confident, not to mistake a vague liope for 
the assurance of election, and because, with the rest of 
the congregation, he was always being told how few in 
number were those elect, and how extremely unlikely 
that there could be many of those few in that one 
flock. Eead any of the theological literature of the 



S6 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

period, and mark the gulf that lies between us and our 
fathers. There were many kinds of preachers, just as 
at present — the eloquent, the high and dry, the low and 
threatening, the forcible-feeble, the florid, the prosy, the 
scholarly — but they all seemed to preach the same doc- 
trine of hopelessness, the same Gospel of Despair, the 
same Father of all Cruelty, the same Son who could at 
best help only a few ; and when any of the congregation 
dared to speak the truth, which was seldom, these 
blasphemous persons whispered that it was best to live 
and enjoy the present, and to leave off trying to save 
their souls against such fearful odds, and with the 
knowledge that if they were going to be saved it would 
be by election and by no merit or effort of their own, 
while, if the contrary was going to happen, it was no 
use striving against fate. Wretched, miserable creed ! 
To think that unto this was brought the Divine Message 
of the Son of Man ! And to think of the despairing 
deathbeds of the careless, the lifelong terror of the 
most religious, and the agony of the survivors over the 
death of one ' cut off in his sins ' I 

What we now call the ' life ' of the Church, with its 
meetings, committees, fraternities, guilds, societies, and 
organisations, then simply did not exist. The clergy- 
man had an easy time ; he visited little, he had an 
Evening Service once a week, he did not pretend to 
keep saints' days and minor festivals and fasts — none of 
his congregation expected him to keep them ; as for his 
being a teetotaller for the sake of the weaker brethren. 



WITH THE MIDDLE-CLASS 97 

that would have seemed to everybody pure foohshness, 
as, indeed, it is, only people now run to the opposite 
belief ; yet he was a good man, for the most part, who 
lived a quiet and exemplary life, and a good scholar — 
scholars are, indeed, sadly to seek among the modern 
clergy — a sound theologian, a judge of good port, and 
a gentleman. But processions, banners, surpliced choirs, 
robes, and the like, he would have regarded as unworthy 
the consideration of one who was a Churchman, a 
Protestant, and a scholar. 

To complete this brief study of the Church fifty 
years ago, let us remark that out of 11,500 livings 
which it possessed, 3,000 were under 100/. and 1,000 
under 60/. a year, that there were 6,080 pluralists and 
2,100 non-residents, that the Dissenters had only been 
allowed to marry in their own chapels and by their 
own clergy in the year 1831, that they were not ad- 
mitted, as Dissenters, to the Universities, and that the 
incomes of some of the Bishops were enormous. 

As for Art, in the house or out of it. Art in pictures, 
sculpture, architecture, dress, furniture, fiction, oratory, 
acting, the middle-class person, the resident in the 
country town, knew nothing of it. His church was 
most likely a barn, his own house was four-square, liis 
furniture was mahogany, his pictures were coloured 
engravings, the ornaments of his rooms were hideous 
things in china, painted red and white, his hangings 
were of a warm and comfortable red, his sofas were 
horsehair, his drawing-room was furnished with a round 



98 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



table, on which lay keepsakes and forget-me-nots ; but 
as the family never used the room, which was generally 
kept locked, it mattered little how it was furnished. 
He dressed, if he was an elderly gentleman, in a spencer, 
buttoned tight, a high black satin stock, and boots up 
to his knees — very likely he still carried his hair in a 
tail. If he was young, he had long and flowing hair, 
waved and curled with the aid of pomade, bear's grease, 




FASHIONS FOR AUGUST, 1836 



FASHIONS FOR MARCH, 1837 



and oil ; he cultivated whiskers, also curled and oiled 
all round his face ; he wore a magnificent stock, with a 
liberal kind of knot in the front : in this he stuck a 
great pin ; and he w^as magnificent in waistcoats. As 
for the ladies' dresses, I cannot trust myself to describe 
them ; the accompanying illustration will be of service 
in bringing the fashion home to the reader. But this is 
the effigy of a London and a fashionable lady. Her 



WITH THE MIDDLE-CLASS 99 

country cousin would be two or three years, at least, 
behind her. Well, the girls had blooming cheeks, bright 
eyes, and simple manners. They were much more re- 
tiring than the modern maiden ; they knew very little 
of young men and their manners, and the young men 
knew very little of them — the novels of the time are 
full of the shyness of the young man in presence of the 
maiden. Their ideas were limited, they had strong 
views as to rank and social degrees, and longed earnestly 
for a chance of rising but a single step ; their accom- 
plishments were generally contemptible, and of Art 
they had no idea whatever. How should they have 
any idea when, year after year, they saw no Art, and 
heard of none ? But they were good daughters, who 
became good wives and good mothers — our own, my 
friends — and we must not make even a show of holding 
them up to ridicule. 

One point must not be forgotten. In the midst of 
all this conventional dulness there was, in the atmo- 
sphere of the Thirties, a certain love of romance which 
showed itself chiefly in a fireside enthusiasm for the 
cause of oppressed races. Poland had many friends ; 
the negro — they even went so far in those days as to 
call him a brother — was warmly befriended ; the case 
of the oppressed Greek attracted the good wishes of 
everybody. Now, sympathy with oppression that is 
unseen may sometimes be followed by sympathy with 
the oppression which is before the eyes ; so that one is 
not surprised to hear that the case of the women and 

L.ofC. 



loo FIFTY YEARS AGO 

the children in the mines and the factories was soon 
afterwards taken seriously in hand. The verse which 
then formed so large a part of family reading had a 
great deal to do with the affections, especially their 
tearful side ; while the tales they loved the best were 
those of knights and fair dames of adventure and 
romance. 

A picture by Du Maurier in Punch once represented 
a man singing a comic song at an 'At Home.' Nobody 
laughed ; some faces expressed wonder ; some, pity ; 
some, contempt ; a few, indignation ; but not one face 
smiled. Consider the difference: in the year 1837 every 
face would have been broadened out in a grin. Do we, 
therefore, laugh no more? We do not laugh so much, 
certainly, and we laugh differently. Our comic man of 
society still tells good stories, but he no longer sings 
songs; in his stories he prefers the rapier or the jewelled 
dao-ger to the bludg-eon. Those who desire to make 
the acquaintance of the comic man, as he was accepted 
in society and in the middle-class, should read the 
works of Theodore Hook and of Albert Smith. To 
begin with, he played practical jokes ; he ccmtinually 
played practical jokes, and he was never killed, as 
would now happen, by his victims. I am certain that 
W9 should kill a man who came to our houses and 
played the jokes which then were permitted to the 
comic man. He poured melted butter into coat pockets 
at suppers ; he turned round signposts, and made them 
point the wrong way, in order to send people whither 



WITH THE MIDDLE-CLASS 



lOI 



they did not wish to go. It may be remarked that his 
tricks were rarely original. He wrenched off door- 
knockers ; he turned off the gas at the meter ; he tied 
strings across the river to knock people backwards in 
their boats ; he tied two doors together, and then rang 
both bells, and waited with a grin from ear to ear ; he 
rang up people in the dead of the night on any pretext ; 
he filled keyholes with powdered slate-pencil when the 
master of the house was coming 
home late ; he hoaxed innocent 
ladies, and laughed when they 
were nearly driven mad with 
worry and terror ; he went to 
masquerades, carrying a iray 
full of medicated sweets — tliink 
of such a thing; ! — which he dis- 
tributed, and then retired, and 
came back in another dress to 
gaze upon the havoc he had 
wrought. Again, it was a time 
when candles were still carried 
about the house, and, as yet, it was thought that gas 
in bedrooms was dangerous. He dipped the candles 
waiting for the ladies when they w^ent to bed into 
water, so that they spluttered and went out, and made 
alarming fireworks when they were lit ; and then, to 
remove the horrible smell, the candles being of tallow, 
he offered to burn pastilles, but these were confections 

of gunpowder and water, and caused the liveliest 
10 




(From a Drawing by George Cruik- 
shauk iu ' Loudou Chai-acters') 



I02 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

emotions, and sent the poor ladies upstairs in an agony 
of nervous terror. 

There was no end to the tricks of this abominable 
person. Once he received an invitation to a great ball, 
which a Eoyal Personage was to honour with his pre- 
sence. The Eoyal Personage was to be regaled in a 
special supper-room, apart from the common herd. 
The table had been laid in this room with the most 
elaborate care and splendour : down the middle of the 
table there meandered a beautiful canal filled with gold 
and silver fish — a contrivance beheved in those remote 
ages to set off and greatly increase the beauty of a 
supper table. Our ingenious friend quickly discovered 
that the room was accessible from the garden, where 
some workmen were still putting the finishing touches 
to their work, the men who had constructed the 
marquee, and had arranged the lamps and things. He 
went, therefore, into the garden : he invited these 
workmen to partake of a little refreshment, led them 
into the Eoyal supper-room, and begged them to help 
themselves, and to spare nothing : in a twinkling the 
tables were cleared. He then put certain chemicals 
into the canal, which instantly killed every fish : this 
done, he returned to the ballroom, and waited for the 
moment when the Illustrious Personage, the hostess on 
his arm, should enter that supper-room, and gaze upon 
those empty dishes. 

On another occasion, he discovered that a respect- 
able butler was in the habit of creeping upstairs, in 



WITH THE MIDDLE-CLASS 103 

order to listen to the conversation, leaving his slippers, 
in position, at the head of the kitchen stairs. He 
therefore hid himself while the poor man, after adjust- 
ing the slippers, walked noiselessly upstairs. He then 
hammered a tintack into the heel of each slipper, and 
waited again, until a confederate gave the alarm, and 
the fat butler, hurrying down, slipped one foot into 
each slipper, and — went headlong into the depths 
below, and was nearly killed. * Never laughed so 
much in all my life, sir.' 

At Oxford, of course, he enjoyed himself wonder- 
fully. For, with a party of chosen friends, he met no 
less a person than the Yice-Chancellor, at ten or eleven 
at night, going home alone, and peacefully. To raise 
that personage, lift him on their shoulders, crown him 
with a lamp cover, and carry him triumphantly to the 
gates of his own College, was not only a great stroke of 
fun, but a thing not to be resisted. And he blew up 
the group of Cain and Abel in the Quadrangle of Brase- 
nose. And what he did with proctors, bulldogs, and 
the like, passeth all understanding. It was at Oxford 
that the funny man made the acquaintance of the 
Major. Now the Major was in love, but he was no 
longer so young as he had been, and his hair was 
getting thin on the top — a very serious thing in the 
days of long hair, wavy, curled, singed, and oiled, flow- 
ing gracefully over the ears and the coat-collar. The 
Major, in an evil moment, commissioned the Practical 
Joker, whose character, one would think, must have 



I04 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

been well known, to procure for him a bottle of a 
certain patent hair-restorer. Of course, the Joker 
brought him a bottle of depilatory mixture, which 
being credulously accepted, and well rubbed in, de- 
prived the poor Major of every hair that was left It 
is needless to relate how, when he was at Richmond 
with a party of ladies, the introduction of the ' maids 
of honour ' was a thing not to be resisted ; and one can 
quite understand how one of the young ladies was led 
on to ordering, in addition to another ' maid of honour,' 
a small Gentleman Usher of the Black Eod, if they had 
one quite cold. 

The middle-class of London, before the development 
of omnibuses, lived in and round the City of London, 
Bloomsbury being the principal suburb ; many thousands 
of well-to-do people, merchants and shopkeepers, lived 
in the City itself, and were not ashamed of their houses, 
and filled the City churches on the Sunday. Some lived 
at Clapham, Camberwell, and Stockivell on the south ; 
a great many at Islington, where a vigorous offshoot of 
the great city ran through the High Street past Sadler's 
Wells as far as Highbury ; a few even lived at Highgate 
and Hampstead. There were the ' short ' stages from 
London to all these places, but, so far as can be gathered, 
most of those who lived in these suburbs before the 
days of the omnibus had their own carriages, and drove 
to town and home again every day. On Sunday they 
entertained their friends, and the young gentlemen of 
the City delighted to hire horses and ride down. The 



WTTB THE MIDDLE-CLASS 



105 



comic literature of the time is full of the Cockney 
horseman. It will be remembered how Mr. Horatio 
Sparkins rode gallantly from town to dine with his 
hospitable friends on Sunday. 

The manners and customs of the Ishngton colony, 
which may, I suppose, be taken for the suburban and 




A SCENE ON BLACKHEATH 

By ' Phiz 
(From ' Sketches in London,' by James Grant) 



Bloomsbury people generally — except that Eussell and 

Bedford Squares were very, very much grander — may 

be read in Albert Smith's ' Adventures of Mr. Ledbury,' 

his 'Natural History of the Gent,' 'The Pottleton 

Legacy,' and other contemporary works. Very good 

reading they are, if approached in the right spirit, 

which is a humble and an inquiring spirit. Many 
10* 



io6 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

remarkable things may be learned from these books. 
For instance, would you know how the middle-class 
evening party was conducted ? Here are a few details. 
The gentlemen, of whose long and wavy hair I have 
already spoken, wore, for evening dress, a high black 
stock, the many folds of which covered the shirt, and 
were enriched by a massive pin ; the white shirt-cuffs 
were neatly turned over their wrists, their dress-coats 
were buttoned, their trousers were tight, and they wore 
straps and pumps. The ladies either wore curls neatly 
arranged on each side — you may still see some old 
ladies who have clung to the pretty fashion of their 
youth — or they wore their hair dropped in a loop down 
the cheek and behind the ear, and then fastened in 
some kind of band with ribbons at the back of the 
head. The machinery of the frocks reminds one of the 
wedding morning in ' Pickwick,' when all the girls were 
crying out to be ' done up,' for they had hooks and 
eyes, and the girls were helpless by themselves. Pink 
was the favourite colour — and a very pretty colour too ; 
and there was plenty of scope for the milliner's art in 
lace and artificial flowers. The elder ladies were mag- 
nificent in turbans, and the younger ones wore across 
the forehead a band of velvet or silk decorated with a 
gold buckle, or something in pearls and diamonds 
Tliis fashion lingered long. I remember — it must have 
been about the year 1850 — a certain elderly maiden 
lady who always wore every day and all day a black 
ribbon across her brows ; this alone gave her a severe 



WITH THE MIDDLE-CLASS 



107 



and keep-yoiir-distance kind of expression ; but, in ad- 
dition, the ribbon contained in the middle, if I remem- 
ber aright, a steel buckle — though a lady, one thinks, 
would hardly wear a steel buckle on her forehead. 
Sometimes there was a wreath of flowers worn like a 
coronet, and sometimes, but I think hardly in Islington, 
a. tiara of jewels. In middle-class circles, the fashion of 
evening dress w^as marred by a fashion, common to 
both sexes, of wearing cleaned 
gloves. Now kid gloves could 
only be cleaned by one process, 
so that the result was an effect 
of turps which could not be 
subdued by any amount of 
patchouli or eau-de-Cologne. 
There were, as yet, no cards 
for the dances, and when a 
waltz was played, everybody 
was afraid to begin. Quadrilles 
of various kinds w^ere danced, 
and the country dance yet lingered at this end of the 
town. The polka came later. Dancing was stopped 
whenever any young lady could be persuaded to sing, 
and happy was the young man whose avocations per- 
mitted him to wear the delightful moustaches forbidden 
in the City and in all the professions. Young Templars 
wore them until they were called, when they had to be 
shaved. For a City man to wear a moustache would 
have been ruin and bankruptcy. 




MAID SERVANT 

(From a Drawing by Cruikshank in 
' Loudon Cliaracters '^ 



xo8 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

Other portions of Albert Smith's works, if read with 
discernment, will enable one to make discoveries of some 
interest. One is that our modern 'Arry is really a 
survival, not, as is sometimes believed, a growth of 
modern days. His ally and mistress, 'Arriet, does not 
seem to have existed at all fifty years ago ; at least there 
is no mention of her; but 'Arry flourished. He did 
really dreadful things. He was even worse than the 
Practical Joker. When he took Titus Ledbury abroad, 
he went into the cathedrals on purpose to spill the holy 
water, to blow out the candles, and to make faces at 
the women kneeling at their prayers ; he got barrel- 
organs into lofts and invited men to bring grisettes and 
dance all night, with a supper brought from the cliar- 
cuterie ; wherever there was jumping, dancing, singing, 
and riot, 'Arry was to the fore. On board the steamer 
he seized a bottle of stout and took up a prominent 
and commanding position, where he drank it before all 
the world, smoking cigars, and laughing loudly at the 
poor people who were ill. At home, he wrenched off 
knockers, played practical jokes, drank more stout, ate 
oysters, chafied bar-maidens, and called for brandy and 
water continually. He was loud in his dress and in his 
voice ; he was insolent, caddish, and offensive in his 
manners. Generally, one thinks, he would end his 
career in Whitecross Street, or the Fleet, or the Queen's 
Bench. Doubtless, however, there are stiir among us 
old gentlemen who now sit at church on Sunday with 
venerable white hair, among their children and grand- 



WITH THE MIDDLE-CLASS 109 

children, and while the voice of the preacher rises and 
falls, their memory wanders back to the days when they 
danced and sang with the grisettes, when they wrenched 
the knockers, when they went from the theatre to' the 
Coal Cellar, and from the Coal Cellar to the Finish ; and 
came home with unsteady step and light purse in the 
grey of the morning. 

The Debtors' Prison belonged chiefly to the great 
middle-class. Before them stalked always a grisly 
spectre, called by some Insolvency and by others Bank- 
ruptcy. This villainous ghost seized its victims by the 
collar and haled them within the walls of a Debtors' 
Prison, where it made them abandon hope, and abide 
there till the day of death. Everybody is familiar with 
the inside of the Fleet, the Queen's Bench, the Marshal- 
sea, and Whitecross Street. They are all pulled down 
now, and the only way to get imprisoned for debt is to 
incur contempt of court, for which Holloway is the re- 
ward. But what a drop from the humours of the 
Queen's Bench, with its drinking, tobacco, singing, and 
noisy revelry, to the solitary cell of Holloway Prison ! 
The Debtors' Prison is gone, and the world is the better 
for its departure. Nowadays the ruined betting-man, 
the rake, the sharper, the profligate, the fraudulent 
bankrupt, have no prison where they can carry on their 
old excesses again, though in humbler way. They go 
down — below the surface — out of sight, and what 
they do, and how they fare, nobody knows, and very 
few care. 



no FIFTY YEARS AGO 



CHAPTER Vn. 

IN SOCIETY. 

As to society in 1837, contemporary commentatorg 
differ. For, according to some, society was always 
gambling, running away with each other's wives, causing 
and committing scandals, or whispering them, the men 
were spendthrifts and profligates, the women extrava- 
gant and heartless. Of course, the same things would 
be said, and are sometimes said, of the present day, and 
will be said in all following ages, because to the ultra- 
virtuous or to the satirist who trots out the old, stale, 
worn-out sham indignation, or to the isn't-it-awful, 
gaping gohemouche^ every generation seems worse than 
all those which preceded it. We know the tag and the 
burden and the weariness of the old song. As for my- 
self, I am no indignant satirist, and the news that 
certain young gentlemen have been sitting up all night 
playing baccarat, drinking champagne, and ' carrying 
on ' after the fashion of youth in all ages, does not 
greatly agitate my soul, or surprise me, or lash me into 
virtuous indignation. Not at all At the same time, if 
one must range oneself and take a side, one may imitate 



IN SOCIETY 



HI 



the example of Benjamin Disraeli and declare for tlie 
side of the angels. And, once a declared follower of 
that army, one may be allowed to rejoice that things 
are vastly improved in the space of two generations. 
Of this there can be no doubt. Making easy allowance 
for exaggeration, and refusing to see depravity in a 
whole class because there are one or two cases that the 
world calls shocking and 
reads eagerly, it is quite 
certain that there is less 
of everything that should 
not be than there used to 
be— less in proportion, 
and even less in actual 
extent. The general 
tone, in short the gene- 
ral manners of society, 
have very much im- 
proved. Of this, I say 
again, there can be no 
doubt. Let any one, for 

instance, read Lady Blessington's ' Victims of Society.' 
Though there is an unreal ring about this horrid book, 
so that one cannot accept it for a moment as a faithful 
picture of the times, such a book could not now be 
written at all ; it would be impossible. 

Let us sing of lighter themes. Take, for instance, 
the great subject of Swagger. There is still Swagger, 
even in these days ; cavalry officers in garrison towns are 




OFFICER OF THE DRAGOON GUARDS 



113 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

still supposed to swagger. Eton boys swagger in their 
own little village ; undergraduates swagger. The put- 
ting on of ' side,' by the way, is a peculiarly modern 
form of swagger : it is the assumption of certain quali- 
ties and powers which are considered as deserving of 
respect. Swagger, fifty years ago, was a coarser kind 
of thing. Officers swaggered ; men of rank swaggered ; 
men of wealth swaggered ; gentlemen in military frogs 
— there are no longer any military frogs — swaggered in 
taverns, clubs, and in the streets. The adoption of 
quiet manners ; the wearing of rank with unobtrusive 
dignity ; the possession of wealth without ostentation ; 
of wit without the desire to be always showing it — 
these are points in which we are decidedly in advance 
of our fathers. There was a great deal of cuff and 
collar, stock and breastpin about the young fellows of 
the day. They were oppressive in their gallantry: in 
public places they asserted themselves ; they were loud 
in their talk. In order to understand the young man 
of the day, one may study the life and career of thai 
gay and gallant gentleman, the Count d'Orsay, model 
and paragon for all young gentlemen of his time. 

They were louder in their manners, and in their 
conversation they were insulting, especially the wits. 
Things were said by these gentlemen, even in a duelhng 
age, which would be followed in these days by a violent 
personal assault. In fact, the necessity of fighting a 
duel if you kicked a man seems to have been the cause 
why men were constantly allowed to call each other, by 



IN SOCIETY 113 

implication, Fool, Ass, Knave, and so forth. So very 
disagreeable a thing was it to turn out in the early 
morning, in order to be shot at, that men stood any- 
thing rather than subject themselves to it. Consider 
the things said by Douglas Jerrold, for instance. They 
are always witty, of course, but they are often mere in- 
sults. Yet nobody seems ever to have fallen upon him. 
And not only this kind of tiling was permitted, but 
things of the grossest taste passed unrebuked. For 
instance, only a few years before our period, at Holland 
House — not at a club, or a tavern, or a tap-room, but 
actually at Holland House, the most refined and cul- 
tured place in London — the folio vmig conversation once 
passed. 

They were asking who was the worst man in the 
whole of history — a most unprofitable question ; and 
one man after the other was proposed. Among the 
company present was the Prince Eegent himself. ' I,' 
said Sydney Smith — no other than Sydney Smith, if you 
please — ' have always considered the Duke of Orleaus, 
Regent of France, to have been the worst man in all 
history ; and he,' looking at the illustrious guest, ' was 
a Prince.' A dead silence followed, broken by the 
Prince himself. ' For my own part,' he said, ' I have 
always considered that he was excelled by his tutor, the 
Abbe Dubois ; and he was a priest, Mr. Sydney.' Con- 
sidering the reputation of the Prince, and the kind of 

Ufe he was generally supposed to be leading, one can 
ii 



ti4 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

hardly believe that any man would have had the im- 
pudence and the bad taste to make such a speech. 

We still constantly hear, in the modern School for 
Scandal, remarks concerning the honour, the virtue, the 
cleverness, the abihty, the beauty, the accomphshments 
of our friends. But it is behind their backs. We no 
longer try to put the truth openly before them. We 
stab in the back ; but we no lonjrer attack in front. 
One ought not to stab at all ; but the back is a portion 
of the frame which feels nothino-. So far the change is 
a distinct gain. 

Society, again, fifty years ago, was exclusive. You 
belonged to society, or you did not ; there was no over- 
lapping, there were no circles which intersected. And 
if you were in society you went to Almack s. If you 
did not go to Almack's you might be a very interesting, 
praiseworthy, well-bred creature ; but you could not 
claim to be in society. Nothing could be more simple. 
Therefore, everybody ardently desired to be seen at 
Almack's. This, however, was not in everybody's 
power. Almack's, for instance, was far more exclusive 
than the Court. Riff-raff might go to Court ; but they 
could not get to Almack's, for at its gates there stood, 
not one angel with a fiery sword, but six in the shape 
of English ladies, terrible in turbans, splendid in dia- 
monds, magnificent in satin, and awful in rank. 

They were the Ladies Jersey, Londonderry, Cowper, 
Brownlow, Willoughby d'Eresby, and Euston. These 
ladies formed the dreaded Committee. They decided 



IN SOCIETY 



115 



wlio should be admitted within the circle ; all applica- 
tions had to be made direct to them ; no one was 
allowed to bring friends. Those who desired to go to 
the balls — Heavens ! what lady did not ardently desire? 
— were obliged to send in a personal request to be 
allowed the honour. Not only this, but they w^ere also 




•^4s 




' A SKETCH IN THE PARK ' — THE DUKE OF WELLINGTON AND MRS. ARBUTHNOT. 

obliged to send for the answer, which took the form of 
a voucher — that is, a ticket — or a simple refusal, from 
which there was no appeal. Gentlemen were admitted 
in the same way, and by the same mode of application, 
as the ladies. In their case, it is pleasing to add, some 
regard was paid to character as well as to birth and 
rank, so that if a man openly and flagrantly insulted 



ii6 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

society he was supposed not to be admitted ; but one 
asks with some trembUnj? how far such rigour would 
be extended towards a young and unmarried Duke. 
Ahnack's was a sort of Royal Academy of Society, the 
Academic diploma being represented by the admitted 
candidate's pedigree, his family connections, and his 
family shield. The heartburnings, jealousies, and mad- 
dening envies caused by this exclusive circle were, I 
take it, the cause of its decline and fall. Trade, even 
of the grandest and most successful kind, even in the 
persons of the grandchildren, had no chance wliatever ; 
no self-made man was admitted ; in fact, it was not 
recognised that a man could make himself; either he 
belonged to a good family or he did not — genius was not 
considered at all ; admission to Almack's was like ad- 
mission to the Order of the Garter, because it pretended 
no nonsense about merit ; wives and daughters of simple 
country squires, judges, bishops, generals, admirals, and 
so forth, knew better than to apply ; the intrigues, 
backstairs influence, solicitation of friends, were as end- 
less at Almack's as the intrigues at the Admiralty to 
procure promotion. Admission could not, however, be 
bought. So far the committee were beyond suspicion 
and beyond reproach ; it was whispered, to be sure, 
that there was favouritism — awful word ! Put yourself 
in the position, if you have imagination enough, of a 
young and beautiful debutante. Admission to Almack's 
means for you that you can see your right and title 
clear to a coronet. What will you not do — what 




> J"^ 



IN SOCIETY 



117 



cringing, supplication, adulation, hypocrisies — to secure 
that card ? And oh ! the happiness, the rapture, of 
sending to Wilhs's Eooms and finding a card waiting for 
you! and the misery and despair of receiving, instead, 
the terrible letter which told you, without reason 
assigned, that the Ladies of the Committee could not 
grant your request ! 

They were not expensive gatherings, the tickets 
being only 7-9. 6^. each, 
which did not include sup- 
per. Dancing began at 
eleven to the strains of 
Weippert's and Collinet's 
band. The balls were 
held in the great room at 
Wilhs's, and the space re- 
served for the dancers was 
roped round. The two 
favourite dances were the 
Valse and the Galop — the linkman 

' sprightly galoppade,' as 

it was called. Quadrilles were also danced. It may be 
interesting to those who have kept the old music to 
learn that in the year 1836 the favourite quadrilles were 
LEclair and La Tele de Bronze^ and the favourite valse 
was Le Beraede contre le Sommeil. They had also 
Strauss's waltzes. 

The decline and fall of Almack's was partly caused 
by the ' favouritism ' which not only kept the place ex- 




ii8 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

elusive, but excluded more than was politic. The only 
chance for the continued existence of such an institution 
is that it should be constantly enlarging its boundaries, 
just as the only chance for the continued existence of 
such an aristocracy as ours is that it should be always 
admitting new members. Somehow the kind of small 
circle which shall include only the creme de la creme is 
always falling to pieces. We hear of a club which is 
to contain only the very noblest, but in a year or two 
it has ceased to exist, or it is like all other clubs. 
Moreover, a great social change has now passed over 
the country. The stockbroker, to speak in allegory, has 
got into Society. Eespect for Eank, fifty years ago 
universal and profound, is rapidly decaying. There are 
still many left who believe in some kind of superiority 
by Divine Eight and the Sovereign's gift of Eank, even 
though that Eank be but ten years old, and the grand- 
father's shop is still remembered. We do not pretend 
to believe any longer that Eank by itself makes people 
cleverer, more moral, stronger, more religious, or more 
capable ; but some of us still believe that, in some 
unknown way, it makes them superior. These thinkers 
are getting fewer. And the decay of agriculture, 
which promises to continue and increase, assists the 
decay of Eespect for Eank, because such an aristocracy 
as that of these islands, when it becomes poor, becomes 
contemptible. 

The position of women, social and intellectual, has 
wholly changed. Nothing was heard then of women's 



IN SOCIETY 119 

equality, nothing of woman suffrage ; there were no 
women on Boards, there were none who lectured and 
spoke in public, there were few who wrote seriously. 
Women regarded themselves, and spoke of themselves, 
as inferior to men in understanding, as they were in 
bodily strength. Their case is not likely to be under- 
stated by one of themselves. Hear, therefore, what 
Mrs. John Sandford — nowadays she would have been 
Mrs. Ethel Sandford, or Mrs. Christian-and maiden-name 
Sandford — says upon her sisters. It is in a book called 

* Woman in her Social and Domestic Character.' 

' There is something unfeminine in independence. 
It is contrary to Nature, and therefore it offends. A 
really sensible woman feels her dependence ; she does 
what she can, but she is conscious of inferiority, and 
therefore grateful for support^ The italics are mine. 

* In everything that women attempt they should show 
their consciousness of dependence. . . . They should 
remember that by them influence is to be obtained, not 
by assumption, but by a delicate appeal to affection or 
principle. Women in this respect are something like 
children — the more they show their need of support, 
the more engaging they are. The appropriate expression 
of dependence is gentleness.* The whole work is exe- 
cuted in this spirit, the keynote being the inferiority 
of woman. Heavens! with what a storm would such a 
book be now received ! 

In the year 1835 Herr Eaumer, the German his- 
torian, visited England, and made a study of the 



I20 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

English people, which he afterwards published. From 
this book one learns a great deal concerning the manners 
of the time. For instance, he went to a dinner-party 
given by a certain noble lord, at which the whole 
service was of silver, a silver hot-water dish being 
placed under every plate ; the dinner lasted until mid- 
night, and the German guest drank too much wine, 
though he missed ' most of the healths.' It was then 
the custom at private dinner-parties to go on drinking 
healths after dinner, and to sit over the wine till mid- 
night. He goes to an 'At Home' at Lady A.'s. ' Almost 
all the men,' he tells us, 'were dressed in black coats, 
black or coloured waistcoats, and black or white cravats.' 
Of what colour were the coloured waistcoats, and of 
what colour the coats which were not black, and how 
were the other men dressed.^ Perhaps one or two may 
have been Bishops in evening dress. Now the evening 
dress of a Bishop used to be blue. I once saw a Bishop 
dressed all in blue — he was a very aged Bishop, and it 
was at a City Company's dinner — and I was told it had 
formerly been the evening dress of Bishops, but was 
now only worn by the most ancient among them. Herr 
Eaumer mentions the ' countless ' carriages in Hyde 
Park, and observes that no one could afford to keep a 
carriage who had not 3,000/. a year at least. And at 
fashionable dances he observes that they dance nothing 
but waltzes. The English ladies he finds beautifid, and 
of the men he observes that the more they eat and 
drink the colder they become — because they drank 



IN SOCIETY 121 

port, no doubt, under the influence of which, though 
the heart glows more and more, there comes a time 
when the brow clouds, and the speech thickens, and 
the tongue refuses to act. 

The dinners were conducted on primitive principles. 
Except in great houses, where the meat and game were 
carved by the butler, everything was carved on the 
table. The host sat behind the haunch of mutton, and 
* helped ' with zeal ; the guests took the ducks, the 
turkey, the liare, and the fowls, and did their part, 
conscious of critical eyes. A dinner was a terrible 
ordeal for a young man who, perhaps, found himself 
called upon to dissect a pair of ducks. He took up 
the knife with burning cheeks and perspiring nose ; 
now, at last, an impostor, one who knew not the ways 
of polite society, would be discovered ; he began to 
feel for the joints, while the cold eyes of his hostess 
gazed reproachfully upon him — ladies, in those days, 
knew good carving, and could carve for themselves. 
Perhaps he had, with a ghastly grin, to confess that he 
could not find those joints. Then the dish was removed 
and given to another guest, a horribly self-reliant 
creature, who laughed and talked while he dexterously 
sliced the breast and cut off the legs. If, in his agony, 
the poor wretch would take refuge in the bottle, he had 
to wait until some one invited him to take wine — hor- 
rible tyranny ! The dinner-table was ornamented with 
a ereat epergne of silver or glass ; after dinner the cloth 
was removed, showing the table, deep in colour, lustrous, 



122 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

well waxed; and the gentlemen began real business with 
the bottle after the ladies had gone. 

Very httle need be said about the Court. It was then 
in the hands of a few families. It had no connection 
at all with the hfe of the country, which went on as if 
there were no Court at all. It is strange that in these 
fifty years of change the Court should have altered so 
little. Now, as then, the Court neither attracts, nor 
attempts to attract, any of the leaders in Art, Science, 
or Literature. Now, as then, the Court is a thing apart 
from the life of the country. For the best class of all, 
those who are continually advancing the country in 
science, or keeping alight the sacred lamp of letters, 
who are its scholars, architects, engineers, artists, poets, 
authors, journalists, who are the merchant adventurers 
of modern times, who are the preachers and teachers, 
the Court simply does not exist. One states the fact 
without comment. But it should be stated, and it 
should be clearly understood. The whole of those men 
who in this generation maintain the greatness of our country 
in the ways where alone greatness is desirable or memorable, 
except in arms, the only men of this generation whose 
memories will live and adorn the Victorian era, are 
strangers to the Court. It seems a great pity. An ideal 
Court should be the centre of everything — Art, Letters, 
Science, all. 

As for the rest of society — how the people had drums 
and routs and balls; how they angled for husbands; 
now they were hollow and unnatural, and so forth — 



IN SOCIETY 123 

you may read about it in the pages of Thackeray. 
And I, for one, have never been able to understand 
how Thackeray got his knowledge of these exclusive 
circles. Instead of dancing at Almack's he was taking 
his chop and stout at tlie Cock ; instead of gambling 
at Crockford's he was writing ' copy ' for any paper 
which woidd take it. When and where did he meet 
Miss Newcome and Lady Kew and Lord Steyne ? Per- 




WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY 



haps lie wrote of them by intuition, as Disraeli wrote 
the ' Young Duke.' ' My son, sir,' said the elder 
Disraeli proudly, ' has never, I believe, even seen a 
Duke.' 

One touch more. There is before me a beautiful, 
solemn work, one in wliich the writer feels his responsi- 
bihties almost too profoundly. It is on no less important 
a subject than Etiquette, containing Eules for the 



124 I'IFTY YEARS AGO 

Conduct of Life on the most grave and serious occasions. 
I permit myself one or two extracts ; — 

' Familiarity is the greatest vice of Society. When 
an acquaintance says "My dear fellow," cut him imme- 
diately.' 

' Never enter your own house without bowing to 
every one you may meet there.' 

' Never ask a lady any questions about anything 
whatever.' 

' If you have drunk wine with every one at the 
table and wish for more ' — Heavens ! More ! And 
after drinking wiih every one at the table ! — ' wait till 
the cloth is removed.' 

' Never permit the sanctity of the drawing-room to 
be violated by a Boot.' 



CHAPTER VIII. 

AT THE PLAY AND THE SHOW. 

Fifty years ago the Theatre was, far more than al 
present, the favourite amusement of the Londoners. 
It was a passion with them. They did not go only to 
laugh and be pleased as we go now ; they went as 
critics ; the pit preserves to this day a reputation, long 
since lost, for critical power. A large number of the 
audience went to every new performance of a stock 
piece in order to criticise. After the theatre they 
repaired to the Albion or the Cock for supper, and to 
talk over the performance. Fifty years ago there were 
about eighteen theatres, for a London of two millions.-^ 
These theatres were not open all the year round, 
but it was reckoned that 20,000 people went every 
night to the theatre. There are now thirty theatres at 
least open nearly the whole year round. I doubt if 
there are many more than 20,000 at all of them 

' The following were the London theatres in the year 1837: Her Ma- 
jesty's, formerly the King's: Drury Lane, Covent Garden, the * Siimmev 
House,' or Haymarket; the Lyceum, the Prince's (now St. James's), the 
Adelplii, the City of London (Norton Folgate), the Surrey, Astley's, the 
Queen's (afterwards the Prince of Wales's), the Olympic, and the Strand, 
the Cohurg (originally opened as the Victoria in 18.33), Sadler's Wells, the 
Royal Pavilion, the Garrick, and the Clarence (now the King's Cross). 



.126 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

toijetlier on an averaa;e in one nif]i;ht. Yet London has 
doubled, and the visitors to London have been multi- 
phed by ten. It is by the visitors that the theatres are 
kept up. The people of London have in great measure 
lost their taste for the theatres, because they have gone 
to live in the suburbs. Who, for instance, that lives in 
Hampstead and wishes to get up in good time in the 
morning can take his wife often to the theatre ? It 
takes an hour to drive into town, the hour after dinner. 
The play is over at a little after eleven ; if he takes a 
cab, the driver is sulky at the thought of going up the 
hill and getting back again without another fare ; if he 
goes and returns in a brougham, it doubles the expense. 
Formerly, when everybody lived in town, they could 
walk. Again, the price of seats has enormously gone 
up. Where there were two rows of stalls at the same 
price as the dress circle — namely, four shillings — there 
are now a dozen at the price of half a guinea. And it 
is very much more the fashion to take the best places, 
so that the dress circle is no longer the same highly 
respectable part of the house, while the upper boxes 
are now ' out of it' altogether, and, as for the pit, no 
man knoweth whether there be any pit still. 

Besides, there are so many more distractions ; a more 
widely spread habit of reading, more music, more art, 
more society, a fuller life. The theatre was formerly 
— it is still to many — the only school of conversation, 
wit, manners, and sentiment, the chief excitement which 
took them out of their daily lives, the most delightful, 



AT THE FLAY AND THE SHOW 127 

the most entrancing manner of spending the evening. 
If the theatre were the same to the people of London 
as it used to be, the average attendance, counting the 
visitors, would be not 20,000 but 120,000. 

The reason why some of the houses were open for 
six months only was that the Lord Chancellor grantea 
a licence for that period only, except to the patent 
houses. The Haymarket was a summer house, from 
April to October ; the Adelphi a winter house, from 
October to April. 

The most fashionable of the houses was Her Majesty's, 
where only Italian Opera was performed. Everybody 
in society was obliged to have a box for the season, for 
which sums were paid varying with the place in the 
house and the rank and wealth of the tenant. Thus 
the old Duke of Gloucester used to pay three hundred 
guineas for the season. On levee days and drawing- 
rooms the fashionable world went to the Opera in their 
Court dresses, feathers, and diamonds, and all — a very 
moving spectacle. Those who only took a box in order 
to keep up appearances, and because it was necessary 
for one in society to have a box, used to sell seats — 
commonly called bones, because a round numbered bone 
was the ticket of admission — to their friends ; sometimes 
they let their box for a single night, a month, or the 
whole season, by means of the agents, so that, except 
for the honour of it, as the man said when the bottom 
of his sedan-chair fell out, one might as well have had 
none at all. 



128 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

The prices of admission to the theatres were very 
much less than obtain at the present day. At Drury 
Lane the boxes and stalls, of which there were two or 
three rows only, were Is. each ; the pit was 05. 6c?., 
the upper boxes 25., and the gallery \s. At Co vent 




^o 



LISTON AS ' PAUL PRY ' 
(From a Drawing bj- George Cruikshank) 



Garden, where they were great at spectacle, with per- 
forming animals, the great Bunn being lessee, the prices 
were lower, the boxes being 4s., the pit 2*., the upper 
boxes \s. 6d^., and gallery Is. At the Haymarket the 
boxes were 5s., the pit 3s., and the gallery Is. 6<:/. 

The actors and actresses were many and good. At 




r^i ^^' 



^^-c^yKi 



■c^ 



AT THE PLAY AND THE SHOW 129 

the Haymarket they had Farren, Webster, Buckstone, 
Mrs. Glover, and Mrs. Humby. At the Olympic, Elhs- 
ton, Liston, and Madame Vestris. Helen Faucit made 
her first appearance in 1835 ; Miss Fanny Kemble hers 
in 1830. Charles Mathews, Harley, Macready, and 
Charles Kean were all playing. I hardly think that in 
fifty years' time so good a hst will be made of actors of 
the present day whose memory has lasted so long as 
those of 1837. The salaries of actors and singers varied 
greatly, of course. Malibran received 125Z. a night, 
Charles Kean 50/. a night, Macready 30/. a week, 
Farren 20/. a week, and so on, down to the humble 
chorister — they then called her a figurante — with her 
125. or I85. a week. 

As for the national drama, I suppose it had never 
before been in so wretched a state. Talfourd's play of 
' Ion ' was produced about this time ; but one good play 
— supposing ' Ion ' to be a good play — is hardly enough 
to redeem the character of the age There were also 
tragedies by Miss Mitford and Miss Baillie — strange that 
no woman has ever written even a tolerable play — but 
these failed to keep the stage. One Mr. Maturin, now 
dying out of recollection, also wrote tragedies. The 
comedies and farces were written by Planche, Reynolds, 
Peake, Theodore Hook, Dibdin, Leman Eede, Poole, 
Maddison Morton, and Moncrieff. A really popular 
writer, we learn with envy and astonishment, would 
make as much as 30/., or even 40/., by a good piece. 
Think of making 30/. or 40/. by a good piece at the 



13° 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



.^^ 



theatre ! Was not that noble encouragement for the 
playwrights ? Thirty pounds for one piece ! It takes 
one's breath away. Would not Mr. Gilbert, Mr. Wills, 
and Mr. George Sims be proud and happy men if they 
could get 30/. — a whole lump of 30/. — for a single 
_ . piece ? We can ima- 

gine the tears of joy 
running down their 
cheeks. 

The decline of the 
drama was attributed 
by Eaumer to the entire 
absence of any protec- 
tion for the dramatist. 
This is no doubt partly 
true ; but the dramatist 
was protected, to a 
certain extent, by the 
difficulty of getting 
copies of his work. Shorthand writers used to try- — 
they still try — to take down, unseen, the dialogue. 
Generally, however, they are detected in the act and 
desired to withdraw. As a rule, if the dramatist did not 
print the plays, he was safe, except from treachery on the 
part of the prompter. The low prices paid for dramatic 
work were the chief causes of the decline — say, ratlier, 
the dreadful decay, dry rot, and galloping consumption 
— of the drama fifty years ago. Who, for instance, 
would ever expect good fiction to be produced if it was 





^^^ Jj-^^^rzD 



AT THE PLAY AND THE SHOW 131 

rewarded at the rate of no more than 30/., or even 300/., 
a novel ? Great prizes are incentives for good work. 
Good craftsmen will no longer work if the pay is bad ; 
or, if they work at all, they will not throw their hearts 
into the work. The great success of Walter Scott was 
the cause why Dickens, Thackeray, George Eliot, Charles 
Eeade, and the many second-rate novelists chose fiction 
rather than the drama for their energies. One or two 
of them, Dickens and Reade, for instance, were always 
hankerinor after the stasre. Had dramatists received the 
same treatment in England as in France, many of these 
writers would have seriously turned their attention to 
the theatre, and our modern dramatic literature would 
have been as rich as our work in fiction. The stage 
now offers a great fortune, a far greater fortune, won 
much more swiftly than can be got by fiction, to those 
who succeed. 

As for the pieces actually produced about this 
period, they were chiefly adaptations from novels. 
Thus, we find ' Esmeralda ' and ' Quasimodo,' two plays 
from Victor Hugo's ' Hunchback of Notre Dame ; ' 
* Lucillo,' from ' The Pilgrims of the Rhine,' by Lytton ; 
Bulwer, indeed, was continually being dramatised ; ' Paul 
Clifford ' and 'Rienzi,' among others, making their appear- 
ance on the stage. For other plays there were ' Zampa ' 
or ' The Corsair,' due to Byron ; ' The Waterman,' ' The 
Irish Tutor,' ' My Poll and my Partner Joe,' with T. P. 
Cooke, at the Surrey Theatre. The comedy of the time 
is very well illustrated by Lytton's ' Money,' stagey and 



132 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



unreal. The scenery, dresses, and general mise- en-scene 
would now be considered contemptible. 

Apart from the Italian Opera, music was very well 
supported. There were concerts in great numbers : the 

Philharmonic, the 
Vocal Society, and 
the Eoyal Academy 
of Music gave their 
concerts at the 
King's Ancient Con- 
cert Eooms, Han- 
over Square. Willis's 
Eooms were also used 
for music ; and the 
Cecilia Society gave 
its concerts in Moor- 
gate Street. 

There were many 
other shows, apart 
from the well-known 
sights of town. 
Madame Tussaud's 
Gallery in Baker 
Street, the Hippo- 
drome at Bayswater, the Colosseum, the Diorama in 
Eegent's Park, the Panorama in Leicester Square- 
where you could see ' Peru and the Andes, or the 
Village engulfed by the Avalanche ' — and the Panorama 
in Eeoent Street attracted the less frivolous and those 




T. P. COOKE IN 'BLACK-EYED SUSAN ' 





A:pM^^^ 



AT THE FLAY AND THE SHOW 



^ZZ 



who came to town for the improvement of their minds. 
For Londoners themselves there were the Vauxhall 
Gardens first and foremost — the most dehghtful places 
of amusement that London ever possessed except, 
perhaps, Belsize. Everybody went to Vauxhall ; those 
who were respectable and those who were not. Far 
more beautiful than the electric lights in the Gardens 




VAUXHALL GAKDENS 



of the ' Colonies ' were the two hundred thousand 
variegated oil lamps, festooned among the trees of 
Vauxhall ; there was to be found music, singing, act- 
ing, and dancing. Hither came the gallant and golden 
youth from the West End ; here were seen sober and 
honest merchants with their wives and daughters ; here 
were ladies of doubtful reputation and ladies about 
whose reputation there could be no doubt ; here there 



134 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

were painted arbours wliere they brought you the 
famous Vauxhall ham — ' sHced cobwebs ; ' the famous 
Vauxhall beef — ' book musUn, pickled and boiled ; ' and 
the famous Vauxhall punch — Heavens ! how the honest 
folk did drink that punch ! 

I have before me an account of an evening spent at 
Vauxhall about this time by an eminent drysalter of the 
City, his partner, a certain Tom, and two ladies, the dry- 
salter's wife and his daughter Lydia ; ' a laughter-loving 
lass of eighteen, who dearly loved a bit of gig.' Do you 
know, gentle reader, what is a ' bit of gig ' ? This young 
lady laughs at everything, and cries, ' What a bit of gig ! ' 
There was singing, of course, and after the singing there 
were fireworks, and after the fireworks an ascent on the 
rope. ' The ascent on the rope, which Lydia had never 
before witnessed, was to her particularly interesting. 
For the first time during the evening she looked serious, 
and as the mingled rays of the moon (then shining 
gloriously in the dark blue heavens, attended by her 
twinkling handmaidens, the stars), which ever and anon 
shot down as the rockets mounted upwards, mocking 
the mimic pyrotechnia of man, and the flashes of red 
fire played upon her beautiful white brow and ripe 
lips — blushing like a cleft cherry — we thought for a 
moment that Tom was a happy blade. While we were 
gazing on her fine face, her eye suddenly assumed its 
wonted levity, and she exclaimed in a laughing tone — 
" Now, if the twopenny postman of the rockets were to 
mistake one of the directions and dehver it among the 



AT THE FLAY AND THE SHOW 135 

crowd so as to set fire to six or seven muslin dresses, 
what a bit of gig it would be ! " ' 

Another delightful place was the Surrey Zoological 
Gardens, which occupied fifteen acres, and had a large 
lake in the middle, very useful for fireworks and the 
showing off of the Mount Vesuvius they stuck up on 
one side of it. The carnivorous animals were kept in 
a single building, under a great glazed cupola, but the 
elephants, bears, monkeys, &c., had separate buildings 
of their own. Flower shows, balloon ascents, fireworks, 
and all kinds of exciting things went on at the Surrey 
Zoo. 

The Art Galleries opened every year, and, besides 
the National Gallery, there were the Society of British 
Artists, the Exhibition of Water Colours, and the British 
Institution in Pall Mall. At the Eoyal Academy of 
1837, Turner exhibited his ' JuHet,' Etty a ' Psyche and 
Venus,' Landseer a 'Scene in Chillingham Park,' Wilkie 
the ' Peep o' Day Boy's Cabin,' and Eoberts the ' Chapel 
of Ferdinand and Isabella at Granada.' 

There were Billiard Eooms, where a young man 
from the country who prided himself upon his 
play could get very prettily handled. There were 
Cigar Divans, but as yet only one or two, for the 
smoking of cigars was a comparatively new thing — in 
fact, one who wrote in the year 1829 thought it 
necessary to lay down twelve solemn rules for the right 
smoking of a cigar ; there were also Gambling Hells, 
of which more anon. 



136 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

Fifty years ago, in short, we amused ourselves very 
well. We were fond of shows, and there were plenty 
of them ; we liked an al fresco entertainment, and we 
could have it ; we were not quite so picksome in the 
matter of company as we are now, and therefore we 
endured the loud vulgarities of the tradesman and his 
family, and shut our eyes when certain fashionably 
dressed ladies passed by showing their happiness by 
the loudness of their laughter ; we even sat with our 
daughter in the very next box to that in which young 
Lord Tomnoddy was entertaining these young ladies 
with cold chicken and pink champagne. It is, we 
know, the privilege of rank to disregard morals in 
public as well as in private. Then we had supper and 
a bowl of punch, and so home to bed. 

Those who are acquainted with the doings of Corin- 
thian Tom and Bob Logic are acquainted with the 
Night Side of London as it was a few years before 
1837. Suffice it to say that it was far darker, far more 
vicious, far more dangerous fifty years ago than it is 
now. Heaven knows that we have a Night Side still, 
and a very ugly side it is, but it is earlier by many 
hours than it used to be, and it is comparatively free 
from gambling. houses, from bullies, blackmailers, and 
sharks. 



CHAPTER DC. 

IN THE HOUSE. 

On November 20, 1837, the young Queen opened her 
first Parhament in person. The day was brilhant with 
sunshine, the crowds from Buckingham Palace to the 
House were immense, the House of Lords was crammed 
with Peers and the gallery with Peeresses, who oc- 
cupied every seat, and even ' rushed ' the reporters' 
gallery, three reporters only having been fortunate 
enough to take their places before the rush.^ 

When Her Majesty arrived and had taken her place, 
there was the rush from the Lower House. 

' Her Majesty having taken the oath against Popery, 
which she did in a slow, serious, and audible manner, 
proceeded to read the Royal Speech ; and a specimen 
of more tasteful and effective elocution it has never 
been my fortune to hear. Her voice is clear, and her 
enunciation distinct in no ordinary degree. Her utter- 
ance is timed with admirable judgment to the ear : it is 
the happy medium between too slow and too rapid. 

* I am indebted for the whole of this -chapter to Random Recollections of 
the Lords and Commons, 1838. 



138 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



Nothing could be more accurate than her pronuncia- 
tion ; while the musical intonations of her voice im- 
parted a peculiar charm to the other attributes of her 




THE ' NEW ' HOUSES OF PAKLIAMENT, FBOM THE RIVER 
(First stone laid 1840. Sir Charles Barry, architect) 



IN THE HOUSE 139 

elocution. The most perfect stillness reigned through 
the place while Her Majesty was reading her Speech. 
Not a breath was to be heard : had a person, unblessed 
with the power of vision, been suddenly taken within 
hearing of Her Majesty, while she was reading her 
Speech, he might have remained some time under the 
impression that there was no one present but herself. 
Her self-possession was the theme of universal admira- 
tion. 

* In person Her Majesty is considerably below the 
average height. Her figure is good ; rather inclined, 
as far as one could judge from seeing her in her robes 
of state, to the slender form. Every one who has seen 
her must have been struck with her singularly fine 
bust. Her complexion is clear, and has all the indica- 
tions of excellent health about it. Her features are 
small, and partake a good deal of the Grecian cast. 
Her face, without being strikingly handsome, is remark- 
ably pleasant, and is indicative of a mild and amiable 
disposition.* 

In the House of Lords the most prominent figures 
were, I suppose, those of Lord Brougham and the Duke 
of Wellington. The debates in the Upper House, 
enlivened by the former, and by Lords Melbourne, 
Lyndhurst, and others, were lively and animated, com- 
pared with the languor of the modern House. The 
Duke of Eutland, the Marquis of Bute, the Marquis of 
Camden (who paid back into the Treasury every year 
the salary he received as Teller of the Exchequer), the 



140 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



Earls of Stanhope, Devon, Falmouth, Lords Strangford, 
Eolls, Alvanley, and Eedesdale were the leaders of the 
Conservatives. The Marquis of Sligo, the Marquis of 
Northampton, the Earls of Eosebery, Gosford, Minto, 
Shrewsbury, and Lichfield, Lords Lynedoch and 
Portman were the leaders of the Liberals. With the 




LORD MELBOURNE 



exceptions of Wellington, Brougham, Melbourne, and 
Eedesdale, it is melancholy to consider that these 
illustrious names are nothing more than names, and» 
convey no associations to the present generation. 

Among the members of the Lower House were 
many more who have left behind them memories which 
are not likely to be soon forgotten. Sir Eobert Peel, 



IN THE HOUSi 



141 



Lord Stanley, Thomas Macaulay, Cobbett, Lord John 
Russell, Sir John Cam Hobhouse, Lord Palmerston, Sir 
Francis Burdett, Hume, Roebuck, O'Connell, Lytton 
Bulwer, Benjamin D'Israeli, and last sole' survivor, 
William Ewart Gladstone, were all in the Parliaments 




THOMAS BABINGTON JUCAULAT 



immediately before or immediately after the Queen's 
Accession. 

If you would like to know how these men impressed 
their contemporaries, read the following extracts from 
Grant's ' Random Recollections.' 

' Mr. Thomas Macaulay, the late member for Leeds, 
and now a member of Council in India, could boast of 



142 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



a brilliant, if not a very long Parliamentary career. 
He was one of those men who at once raised himself to 
the first rank in the Senate. His maiden speech elec- 
trified the House, and called forth the highest com- 
pliments to the speaker from men of all parties. He 
was careful to preserve the laurels he had thus so 
easily and suddenly won. He was a man of shrewd 




LOKD PALMEESTON 



mind, and knew that if he spoke often, the probability 
was he would not speak so well ; and that consequently 
there could be no more likely means of lowering him 
from the elevated station to which he had raised him- 
self, than frequently addressing the House. 

'His speeches were always most carefully studied, 
and committed to memory, exactly as he delivered 



IN THE HOUSE 



M3 



them, beforehand. He bestowed a world of labour on 
their preparation ; and, certainly, never was labour 




BURDETT, HUME, AND O'CONNELL 
(From a Drawing by IB.) 



bestowed to more purpose. In every sentence you saw 
the man of genius — the profound scholar — the deep 



144 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

thinker — the close and powerful reasoner. You scarcely 
knew which most to admire — the beauty of his ideas, 
or of the language in which they were clothed ' 

' Lord John Eussell is one of the worst speakers in 
the House, and but for his excellent private character, 
his family connections, and his consequent influence in 
the political world, would not be tolerated. There are 
many far better speakers, who, notwithstanding their 
innumerable efforts to catch the Speaker's eye in the 
course of important debates, hardly ever succeed ; or, 
if they do, are generally put down by the clamour 
of honourable members.. His voice is weak and his 
enunciation very imperfect. He speaks in general in 
so low a tone as to be inaudible to more than one-half 
of the House. His style is often in bad taste, and he 
stammers and stutters at every fourth or fifth sentence. 
When he is audible he is always clear ; there is no 
mistaking his meaning. Generally his speeches are 
feeble in matter as well as manner ; but on some great 
occasions I have known him make very able speeches, 
more distinguished, however, for the clear and forcible 
way in which he put the arguments which would most 
naturally suggest themselves to a reflecting mind, than 
for any striking or comprehensive views of the sub 
ject.' 

'Of Lord Palmerston, Foreign Secretary, and 
member for Tiverton, I have but little to say. The 
situation he fills in the Cabinet gives him a certain 
degree of prominence in the eyes of the country, which 



IN THE HOUSE 145 

he certainly does not possess in Parliament. His 
talents are by no means of a high order. He is very 
irregular in his attendance on his Parliamentary duties, 
and, when in the House, is by no means active in 
defence either of his principles or his friends. Scarcely 
anything calls him up except a regular attack on him- 
self, or on the way in which the department of the 
public service with which he is entrusted is ad- 
ministered. 

' In person, Lord Palmerston is tall and handsome. 
His face is round, and is of a darkish hue. His hair 
is black, and always exhibits proofs of the sldll and 
attention of the perruqiiier. His clothes are in the 
extreme of fashion. He is very vain of his personal 
appearance, and is generally supposed to devote more of 
his time in sacrificing to the Graces than is consistent with 
the duties of a person who has so much to do with the 
destinies of Europe. Hence it is that the " Times " 
newspaper has fastened on him the sobriquet of Cupid.' 

' Mr. O'Connell is a man of the highest order of 
genius. There is not a member in the House who, in 
this respect, can for a moment be put in comparison 
with him. You see the greatness of his genius in 
almost every sentence he utters. There are others — 
Sir Eobert Peel, for example — who have much more tact 
and greater dexterity in debate ; but in point of genius 
none approach to him. It ever and aiion bursts forth 
with a brilliancy and effect which are quite over- 
whelming. You have tiot well recovered from the 
14 



146 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

overpowering surprise and admiration caused by one 
of his brilliant efTusions, when another flashes upon 
you and produces the same effect. You have no time, 
nor are you in a condition, to weigh the force of his 
arguments ; you are taken captive wherever the 
speaker chooses to lead you from beginning to end.' 




DANIEL O CONNELL 



' One of the most extraordinary attributes in Mr. 
O'Connell's oratory is the ease and facility with which 
he can make a transition from one topic to another. 
" From grave to gay, from lively to severe," never costs 
him an effort. He seems, indeed, to be himself insen- 
sible of the transition. I have seen him begin his speech 
by alluding to topics of an affecting nature, in such a 



IN THE HOUSE 



147 



manner as to excite the deepest sympathy towards the 
sufferers in the mind of the most unfeehng person 
present. I have seen, in other words — I speak with 
regard to particular instances — the tear hterally ghs- 
tening in the eyes of men altogether unused to the 




y*-l.A'^-^-'^ 



O'CONNELL TAKING THE OATHS IN THE HOUSE 
(From a Drawing by ' Phiz ' in 'Sketches in London') 

melting mood, and in a moment afterwards, by a transi- 
tion from the grave to the humorous, I have seen the 
whole audience convulsed with laughter. On the 
other hand, I have often lieard him commence his 
speech in a strain of most exquisite humour, and, by a 
sudden transition to deep pathos, produce the stillness 



148 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

of death in a place in which, but one moment before, 
the air was rent with shouts of laughter. His mastery 
over the passions is the most perfect I ever witnessed, 
and his oratory tells with the same effect whether he 
addresses the "first assembly of gentlemen in the world," 
or the ragged and ignorant rabble of Dublin.' 

' The most distinguished literary man in the House 
is Mr. E. L. Bulwer, member for Lincoln, and author of 
" Pelham," " Eugene Aram," &c. He does not speak 
often. When he does, his speeches are not only pre- 
viously turned over with great care in his mind, but are 
written out at full length, and committed carefully to 
memory. He is a great patron of the tailor, and he is 
always dressed in the extreme of fashion. His manner 
of speaking is very affected : the management of his 
voice is especially so. But for this he would be a 
pleasant speaker. His voice, though weak, is agreeable, 
and he speaks with considerable fluency. His speeches 
are usually argumentative. You see at once that he is 
a person of great intellectual acquirements.' 

' Mr. D'Israeh, the member for Maidstone, is per- 
haps the best known among the new members who have 
made their debuts. As stated in my " Sketches in 
London," his own private friends looked forward to his 
introduction into the House of Commons as a circum- 
stance which would be immediately followed by his 
obtaining for himself an oratorical reputation equal to 
that enjoyed by the most popular speakers in that 
assembly. They thought he would produce an extra- 



IN THE HOUSE 149 

ordinary sensation, both in the House and in the country, 
by the power and splendour of his eloquence. But the 
result differed from the anticipation. 

' When he rose, which he did immediately after Mr. 
O'Connell had concluded his speech, all eyes were 
fixed on him, and all ears were open to listen to his 
eloquence ; but before he had proceeded far, he 
furnished a striking illustration of the hazard that 
attends on highly wrought expectations. After the 
first few minutes he met with every possible manifesta- 
tion of opposition and ridicule from the Ministerial 
benches, and was, on the other hand, cheered in the 
loudest and most earnest manner by his Tory friends ; 
and it is particularly deserving of mention, that even 
Sir Robert Peel, who very rarely cheers any honourable 
gentleman, not even the most able and accomplished 
speakers of his own party, greeted Mr. DTsraeli's speech 
with a prodigality of applause which must have been 
severely trying to the worthy baronet's lungs. 

' At one time, in consequence of the extraordinary 
interruptions he met with, Mr. D'IsraeU intimated his 
willingness to resume his seat, if the House wished him 
to do so. He proceeded, however, for a short time 
longer, but was still assailed by groans and under-growls 
in all their varieties ; the uproar, indeed, often became 
so great as completely to drown his voice. 

' At last, losing all temper, which until now he had 
preserved in a wonderful manner, he paused in the 
midst of a sentence, and, looking the Liberals indignantly 



I50 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

in the face, raised his hands, and, opening his mouth as 
wide as its dimensions would permit, said, in remark- 
ably loud and almost terrific tones — "Though I sit down 
now, the time will come when you will hear me." Mr. 
D'Israeli then sat down amidst the loudest uproar. 

' The exhibition altogether was a most extraordinary 
one. Mr. DlsraeH's appearance and manner were very 
singular. His dress also was peculiar ; it had much of 
a theatrical aspect. His black hair was long and flow- 
ing, and he had a most ample crop of it. His gesture 
was abundant ; he often appeared as if trying with 
what celerity he could move his body from one side to 
another, and throw his hands out and draw them in 
again. At other times he flourished one hand before 
his fiice, and then the other. His voice, too, is of a 
very unusual kind ; it is powerful, and had every justice 
done to it in the way of exercise ; but there is some- 
thing peculiar in it which I am at a loss to cliaracterise. 
BU.S utterance was rapid, and he never seemed at a loss 
for words. On the whole, and notwithstanding the 
result of his first attempt, I am convinced he is a man 
who possesses many of the requisites of a good debater. 
That he is a man of great literary talent, few will dis- 
pute.' 

Lastly, here is a contemporary judgment on Glad- 
stone. The italics are my own, 

' Mr. Gladstone, the member for Newark, is one of 
the most rising young men on the Tory side of the 
House. His party expect great things from him ; and 



IN THE HOUSE 151 

certainly, when it is remembered that his age is only 
twenty-five, the success of the Parhamentary efforts he 
has already made justifies their expectations. He is 
well informed on most of the subjects which usually oc 
cupy the attention of the Legislature, and he is happy 
in turning his information to a good account. He is 
ready, on all occasions which he deems fitting ones, 
with a speech in favour of the policy advocated by the 
party with whom he acts. His extemporaneous resources 
are ample. Few men in the House can improvisate 
better. It does not appear to cost him an effort to 
speak. He is a man of very considerable talent, but 
has nothing approaching to genius. His abilities are 
much more the result of an excellent education, and of 
mature study, than of any prodigahty on the part of 
Nature in the distribution of mental gifts. / have no 
idea that he will ever acquire the reputation of a great 
statesman. His views are not sufficiently profound or 
enlarged for that ; his celebrity in the House of Com 
mons will chiefly depend on his readiness and dexterity as 
a debater, in conjunction with the excellence of his elocu- 
tion, and the gracefulness of his manner when speaking. 
His style is polished, but has no appearance of the 
effect of previous preparation. He displays considerable 
acuteness in reptying to an opponent ; he is quick in 
his perception of anything vulnerable in tlie speech to 
which he replies, and happy in laying the weak point 
bare to the gaze of the House. He now and then in- 
dulges in sarcasm, which is, in most cases, very felici- 



152 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

tous. He is plausible even when most in error. When 
it suits himself or his party, he can apply himself with 
the strictest closeness to the real point at issue; when 
to evade that point is deemed most politic^ no man can 
wander from it more widely. 

* The ablest speech he ever made in the House, and by 
far the ablest on the same side of the question, was 
when opposing, on the 30th of March last, Sir George 
Strickland's motion for the abolition of the negro appren- 
tictship system on the 1st of August next. Mr. Glad- 
stone, I should here observe, is himself an extensive 
West India planter. 

' Mr. Gladstone's appearance and manners are much 
in his fa\"our. He is a fine-looking man. He is about 
the usual height, and of good figure. His countenance 
is mild and pleasant, and has a highly intellectual ex 
pression. His eyes are clear and quick. His eyebrows 
are dark and rather prominent. There is not a dandy 
in the House but envies what Truefitt would call his 
' fine head of jet-black hair.' It is always carefully 
parted from the crown downwards to his brow, where 
it is tastefully shaded. His features are small and 
regular, and his complexion must be a very unworthy 
witness, if he does not possess an abundant stock of 
health.' 

So the ghost of the first Victorian Parliament 
vanishes. All are gone except Mr. Gladstone himself. 
Whether the contemporary judgment has proved well 
founded or not, is for the reader to determine. For my 



.IN THE HOUSE 153 

own part, I confess that my opinion of the author of 
* Eandom Eecollections ' was greatly advanced wlien I 
had read this judgment on the members. We who do 
not sit in the galleries, and are not members, lose the 
enormous advantage of actually seeing the speakers and 
hearing the debates. The reported speech is not the 
real speech ; the written letter remains ; but the fire of 
the orator flames and burns, and passes away. Those 
know not Gladstone who have never seen him and 
heard him speak. 

And as for that old man eloquent, when he closes 
his eyes in the House where he has fought so long, the 
voices around him may well fall unheeded on his ear, 
wliile a vision of the past shows him once more Peel 
and Stanley, Lord John and Palmerston, O'Connell and 
Eoebuck, and, adversary worthiest of all, the man 
whom the House at his first attempt hooted down and 
refused to hear — the great and illustrious Dizzy. 



154 FIFTY YEARS AGO 



CHAPTER X. 

AT SCHOOL AND UNIVERSITY. 

The great schools had no new rivals ; all the modern 
public schools — Cheltenham, Clifton, Marlborough, and 
the like — have sprung into existence or into importance 
since the year 1837. Those who did not go to the 
public schools had their choice between small gram- 
mar schools and private schools. There were a vast 
number of private schools. It was, indeed, recognised 
that when a man could do nothing else and had failed 
in everything that he had tried, a private school was 
still possible for him. The sons of the lower middle- 
class had, as a rule, no choice but to go to a private 
school. At the grammar school they taught Greek and 
Latin — these boys wanted no Greek and no Latin ; 
they wanted a good ' commercial ' education ; they 
wanted to learn bookkeeping and arithmetic, and to 
write a good hand. Nothing else Avas of much account. 
Again, all the grammar schools belonged to the Church 
of England ; sons of Nonconformists were, therefore, 
excluded, and had to go to the private school. 

The man who kept a private school was recom- 



AT SCHOOL AND UNIVERSll'V 155 

mended for his cheapness as much as for his success in 
teaching. As for the latter, indeed, there were no local 
examinations held by the Universities, and no means of 
showing whether he taught well or ill. Probably, in 
the five or six years spent at his school, boys learned 
what their parents mostly desired for them, and left 
school to become clerks or shopmen. The school fees 
were sometimes as low as a guinea a quarter. The 
classes were taught by wretchedly paid ushers ; there 
was no attention paid to ventilation or hygienic 
arrangements ; the cane was freely used all day long. 
Everybody knows the kind of school ; you can read 
about it in the earlier pages of ' David Copperfield,' and 
in a thousand books besides. 

In the pubhc schools, where the birch flourished 
rank and tall and in tropical luxuriance, Latin and 
Greek were the only subjects to which any serious 
attention was given. No science was taught ; of 
modern languages, French was pretended ; history and 
geography were neglected ; mathematics were a mere 
farce. As regards the tone of the schools, perhaps we 
had better not inquire Yet that the general hfe of 
the boys was healthy is apparent from the affection 
with which elderly men speak of their old schools. 
There were great Head Masters before Arnold ; and 
there were pubhc schools where manliness, truth, and 
purity were cultivated besides Rugby. One thing is very 
certain — that the schools turned out splendid scholars, 
and their powers of writing Latin and Greek verse 



156 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

were, wonderful. A year ago we were startled by 
learning that a girl had taken a First Class in the 
Classical Tripos at Cambridge. This, to some who 
remembered the First Class of old, seemed a truly 
wonderful thing. Some even wanted to see her 
iambics. Alas ! a First Class can now be got without 
Greek iambics. What would they have said at West- 
minster fifty years ago if they had learned that a First 
Class could be got at Cambridj^e without Greek or 
Latin verse ? What is philology, which can be 
crammed, compared with a faultless copy of elegiacs, 
which no amount of cramming, even of the female 
brain, can succeed in producing ? 

The Universities were still wholly in the hands of the 
Church. No layman, with one or two exceptions, could 
be Head of a College ; all the Fellowships — or very 
nearly all — were clerical ; the country hving was the 
natural end of the Fellowship ; no Dissenters, Jews, or 
Catholics were admitted into any College unless they 
went through the form of conforming to the rules as 
regards Chapel ; no one could be matriculated without 
signing the Thirty-nine Articles — nearly twenty years 
later I had, as a lad of seventeen, to sign that unrelenting 
definition of Faith on entering King's College, London. 
Perhaps they do it still at that seat of orthodoxy. 
Tutors and lecturers were nearly all in orders. Most 
of the men intended to take orders, many of them in 
order to take family livings. 

The number of undergraduates was about a third 



AT SCHOOL AND UNIVERSITY 157 

of that now standing on the College books. And the 
number of reading men — those who intended to make 
their University career a stepping-stone or a ladder — 
was far less in proportion to the number of ' poll ' men 
than at the present day. The ordinary degree was 
obtained with even less difficulty than at present. 

There were practically only two Triposes at 
Cambridge — the Mathematical and the Classical — in- 
stead of the round dozen or so which now offer their 
honours to the student. No one could get a Fellow- 
ship except through those two Triposes. As for the 
Fellowships and Scholarships, indeed, half of them were 
close — that is to say, confined to students from certain 
towns, or certain counties, or certain schools ; while at 
one College, King's, both Fellowships and Scholarships 
were confined to ' collegers ' of Eton, and the students 
proceeded straight to Fellowships without passing 
through the ordeal of the Senate House. 

Dinner was at four — a most ungodly hour, be- 
tween lunch and the proper hour for dinner! For the 
men who read, it answered pretty well, because it gave 
them a long evening for work ; for the men who did 
not read, it gave a long evening for play. 

There was a great deal of solid drinking among the 

men, both Fellows and undergraduates. The former sat 

in Combination Eoom after Hall and drank the good old 

College port ; the latter sat in each other's rooms and 

drank the fiery port which they bought in the town. 

In the evening there were frequent suppers, with milk- 
15 



158 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

punch and songs. I wonder if they have the milk- 
punch still ; the supper I think they cannot have, be- 
cause they all dine at seven or half-past seven, after 
which it is impossible to take supper. 

In those days young noblemen went up more than 
they do at present, and they spread themselves over 
many colleges. Thus at Cambridge they were found 
at Trinity, John's, and Magdalene. A certain Cabinet 
thirty years ago had half its members on the books of 
St. John's. In these days all the noblemen who go 
to Cambridge flock like sheep to Trinity. There seems 
also to have been gathered at the University a larger 
proportion of county people than in these later years, 
when the Universities have not only been thrown open 
to men of all creeds, but when men of every class find 
in their rich endowments and prizes a legitimate and 
laudable way of rising in the world. ' The recognised 
way of making a gentleman now,' says Charles Kingsley 
in 'Alton Locke,' 'is to send him to the University.' I 
do not know how Charles Kingsley was made a gentle- 
man, but it is certainly a very common method of 
advancing your son if he is clever. Formerly it meant 
ambition in the direction of the Church. Now it means 
many other things — the Bar — Journahsm — Education 
— Science — Archaeology — a hundred ways in which a 
' gentleman ' may be made by first becoming a scholar. 
Nay, there are dozens of men in the City who have 
begun by taking their three years on the banks of the 
Cam or the Isis. For what purposes do the Univer- 



AT SCHOOL AND UNIVERSITY 159 

sities exist but for the encouragement of learning ? 
And if the country agree to call a scholar a gentleman 
— as it calls a solicitor a gentleman — by right of his 
profession, so much the better for the country. But 
Kingsley was born somewhere about the year 1820, 
which was still very much in the eighteenth century, 
when there were no gentlemen recognised except those 
who were gentlemen by birth. 

With close Fellowships, tied to the Church of Eng- 
land, with little or no science, Art, archgeology, 
philology. Oriental learning, or any of the modern 
branches of learning, with a strong taste for port, and 
undergraduates drawn for the most part from the 
upper classes, the Universities were different indeed 
from those of the present day. 

As for the education of women, it was like unto the 
serpents of Ireland. Wherefore we need not devote a 
chapter to this subject at all. 



I bo FIFTY YEARS AGO 



CHAPTEE XI. 

THE TAVERN. 

The substitution of the Restaurant for the Tavern is of 
recent origin. In the year 1 837 there were restaurants, 
it is true, but they were humble places, and confined 
to the parts of London frequented by the French ; for 
Eng:lish of every degree there was the Tavern. Plenty 
of the old Taverns still survive to show us in what places 
our fathers took their dinners and drank their punch. 
The Cheshire Cheese is a survival ; the Cock, until 
recently, was another. Some of them, like the latter, 
had the tables and benches partitioned off*; others, 
like the former, were partly open and partly divided. 
The floor was sanded ; there was a great fire kept up all 
through the winter, with a kettle always full of boiling 
water ; the cloth was not always of the cleanest ; the forks 
were steel ; in the evening there was always a company 
of those who supped — for they dined early — on chops, 
steaks, sausages, oysters, and Welsh rabbit, of those who 
drank, those who smoked their long pipes, and those who 
sang. Yes — those who sang. In those days the song 
went round. If three or four Templars supped at the 



THE TAVERN 



i6i 



Coal Hole, or the Cock, or the Rainbow, one of them 
would presently lift his voice in song, and then be fol- 
lowed by a rival warbler from another box. At the Coal 
Hole, indeed — where met the once famous Wolf Club, 



^^^-- 



"^X^^^ Kv 




7 < f 



EDMUND KEAN AS RICHARD THE THIRD 



Edmund Kean, President — the landlord, one Rhodes 
by name, was not only a singer but a writer of songs, 
chiefly, I apprehend, of the comic kind. I suppose that 
the comic song given by a private gentleman in character 
— that is, with a pocket-handkerchief for a white apron. 



1 62 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

or his coat off, or a battered hat on his head — is almost 
unknown to the younger generation. They see the 
kind of thing, but done much better, at the music-halls. 

Eeally, nothing marks the change of manners more 
than the fact that fifty years ago men used to meet to- 
gether every evening and sing songs over their pipes 
and grog. Not young men only, but middle-aged men, 
and old men, would all together join in the chorus, and 
that joyfully, banging the tables with their fists, and 
laughing from ear to ear — the roysterers are always 
represented as laughing with an absence of restraint 
impossible for us quite to understand. The choruses, 
too, were of the good old ' Whack-fol-de-rol-de-rido' 
character, which gives scope to so much play of senti- 
ment and lightness of touch. 

Beer, of course, was the principal beverage, and 
there were many more varieties of beer than at present 
prevail. One reads of 'Brook clear Kennett' — it used 
to be sold in a house near the Oxford Street end of 
Tottenham Court Eoad ; of Shropshire ale, described as 
'dark and heavy ; ' ot the ' luscious Burton, innocent of 
hops ; ' of new ale, old ale, bitter ale, hard ale, soft ale, 
the ' balmy ' Scotch, mellow October, and good brown 
stout. All these were to be obtained at taverns which 
made a specialite, as they would say now, of any one 
kind. Thus the best stout in London was to be had at the 
Brace Tavern in the Queen's Bench Prison, and the Cock 
was also famous for the same beverage, served in pint 
glasses. A rival of the Cock, in this respect, was the Eain- 



THE TAVERN 



163 



bow, long before the present handsome room was built. 
The landlord of the Eainbow was one William Colls, 
formerly head-waiter at the Cock, predecessor, I take 
it, of Tennyson's immortal friendo But he left the 
Cock to better liimself, and as at the same time Mary — 
the incomparable, the matchless Mary, most beautiful 
of barmaids — left it as 
well, gloom fell upon 
the frequenters of the 
tavern. Mary left the 
Cock about the year 
1820, too early for the 
future Poet Laureate 
to have been one of 
tlie worshippers of her 
Grecian face. Under 
Colls's management the 
Eainbow rivalled the 
Cock in popularity. 
The Cider Cellar, kept 
by Evans of Co vent Gar- 
den, had gone through a 
period of decline, but 
was again popular and well frequented. Mention may 
also be made of Clitter's, of Offley's, famous for its lamb in 
spring ; of the Kean's Head, whose landlord was a great 
comic singer ; of the Harp, haunt of aspiring actors ; of 
the Albion, the Finish, or the Royal Saloon, Piccadilty, 
where one looked in for a ' few goes of max ' — wliat was 




OLD ENTRANCE TO THE COCK, FLEET STREET 



1 64 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

max ? — in the very worst company that London could 
supply. 

It is the fashion to lament the quantity of money still 
consumed in drink. But our drink-bill is nothing, in pro- 
portion, compared with that of fifty years ago. Thus, the 
number of visitors to fourteen great gin shops in London 
was found to average 3,000 each per diem ; in Edin- 
burgh there was a gin-shop for every fifteen families ; 
in one Irish town of 800 people there were eighty-eight 
gin-shops ; in Sheffield, thirteen persons were killed in 
ten days by drunkenness ; in London there was one 
public-house to every fifty-six houses ; in Glasgow one 
to every ten. Yet it was noted at the time that a great 
improvement could be observed in the drinking habits 
of the people. In the year 1742, for instance, there 
were 19,000,000 gallons of spirits consumed by a popu- 
lation of 6,000,000 — that is to say, more than three 
gallons a head every year ; or, if we take only the adult 
men, something like tAvelve gallons for every man in the 
year, which may be calculated to mean one bottle in five 
days. But a hundred years later the population had 
increased to 3 6,000,000, and the consumption of spirits 
had fallen to 8,250,000 gallons, w^iich represents a Httle 
more than half a gallon, or four pints, a head in the 
year. Or, taking the adult men only, their average was 
two gallons and one sixteenth a head, so that each man's 
pint bottle would have lasted him for three weeks. In 
Scotland, however, the general average was twenty- 
seven pints a head, and, taking adults alone, thirteen 



THE TAVERN 165 

gallons and a half a head ; and in Ireland six and a half 
gallons a head. It was noted, also, in the year 1837, 
that the multiplication of coiTee-houses, of which there 
were 1,600 in London alone, proved the growth of 
more healthy habits among the people. 

But though there was certainly more moderation in 
drink than in the earlier years of the century, the drink- 
bill for the year 1837 was prodigious. A case of total 
abstinence was a phenomenon. The thirst for beer was 
insatiable ; with many people, especially farmers, and 
the working classes generally, beer was taken with break- 
fast. Even in my own time — that is to say, when the 
Queenhadbeen reigning for one-and- twenty years or so — 
there were still many undergraduates at Cambridge who 
drank beer habitually for breakfast, and at every break- 
fast-party the tankard was passed round as a finish. In 
country houses, the simple, hght, home-brewed ale, the 
preparation of which caused a most delightful anxiety 
as to the result, was the sole beverage used at dinner 
and supper. Every farmhouse, every large country 
house, and many town house keepers brewed their own 
beer, just as they made their own wines, their own jams, 
and their own lavender water. Beer was universally 
taken with dinner; even at great dinner-parties some 
of the guests would call for beer, and strong ale was 
always served with the cheese. After dinner, only port 
and sherry, in middle-class houses, were put upon the 
table. Sometimes Madeira or Lisbon appeared, but, as 
a rule, wine meant port or sherry, unless, which some- 



i66 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

times happened, it meant cowslip, ginger, or gooseberry. 
Except among the upper class, claret was absolutely un- 
known, as were Burgundy, Rhone wines, Sauterne, and 
all other French wines. In the restaurants every man 
would call for bitter ale, or stout, or half-and-half with 
his dinner, as a matter of course, and after dinner would 
either take his pint of port, or half- pint of sherry, or 
his tumbler of grog. Champagne was regarded as the 
drink of the prodigal son. In the family circle it never 
appeared at all, except at weddings, and perhaps on 
Christmas Day. 

In fact, when people spoke of wine in these days, they 
generally meant port. They bought port by the hogs- 
head, had it bottled, and laid down. They talked 
about their cellars solemnly ; they brought forth bottles 
which had been laid down in the days when George the 
Third was king ; they were great on body, bouquet, and 
beeswing ; they told stories about wonderful port which 
they had been privileged to drink ; they looked forward 
to a dinner chiefly on account of the port which followed 
it; real enjoyment only began when the cloth was re- 
moved, the ladies w^ere gone, and the solemn passage 
of the decanter had commenced. 

There lingers still the old love for this wine — it is, 
without doubt, the king of wines. I remember ten 
years ago, or thereabouts, dining with one — then my 
partner — now, alas ! gathered to his fathers — at the 
Blue Posts, before that old inn was burned down. The 
room was a comfortable old-fashioned first floor, low of 



THE TAVERN 167 

ceiling ; with a great fire in an old-fashioned grate ; set 
with four or five tables only, because not many fre- 
quented this most desirable of dining-places. We took 
with dinner a bottle of light claret ; when we had 
got through the claret and the beef, the waiter, who 
had been hovering about uneasily, interposed. ' Don't 
drink any more of that wash,' he said ; 'let me bring 
you something fit for gentlemen to sit over.' He 
brought us, of course, a bottle of port. They say that 
the taste for port is reviving ; but claret has got so firm 
a hold of our affections that I doubt it. 

As for the drinking of spirits, it was certainly much 
more common then than it is now. Among the lower 
classes gin was the favourite — the drink of the women as 
much as of the men. Do you know why they call it ' blue 
ruin ' ? Some time ago I saw, going into a public-house, 
somewhere near the West India Docks, a tall lean man, 
apparently five-and-forty or thereabouts. He was in 
rags ; his knees bent as he walked, his hands trembled, 
his eyes were eager. And, wonderful to relate, the face 
was perfectly blue — not indigo blue, or azure blue, but 
of a ghostly, ghastly, corpse-hke kind of blue, which 
made one shudder. Said my companion to me, ' That is 
gin.' We opened the door of the pubhc-house and looked 
in. He stood at the bar with a full glass in his hand. 
Then his eyes brightened, he gasped, straightened him- 
self, and tossed it down his throat. Then he came out, 
and he sighed as one who has just had a glimpse of some 
earthly Paradise. Then he walked away with swift and 



t68 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

resolute step, as if purposed to achieve something 
mighty. Only a few yards farther along the road, but 
across the way, there stood another public-house. The 
man walked straight to the door, entered, and took 
another glass, again with the quick grasp of anticipa- 
tion, and again with that sigh, as of a hurried peep 
through the gates barred with the sword of lire. This 
man was a curious object of study. He went into twelve 
more public-houses, each time with greater deter- 
mination on his lips and greater eagerness in his eyes. 
The last glass, I suppose, opened these gates for him and 
suffered him to enter, for his lips suddenly lost their 
resolution, his eyes lost their lustre, he became limp, 
his arms fell heavily — he was drunk, and his face was 
bluer than ever. 

This was the kind of sight whicb Hoo-arth could 
see every day when he painted ' Gin Lane.' It was in 
the time when-drinking-shops had placards stuck outside 
to the effect that for a penny one might get drunk, 
and blind drunk for twopence. But an example of a 
' blue ruin,' actually walking in the flesh, in these days 
one certainly does not expect to see. Next to gin, 
rum was the most popular. There is a full rich flavour 
about rum. It is afiectionately named after the delicious 
pineapple, or after the island where its production is the 
most abundant and the most kindly. It has always been 
the drink of Her Majesty's Navy; it is still the favourite 
beverage of many West India Islands, and many millions 
of sailors, niggers, and coolies. It is hallowed by histo- 



THE TAVERN 169 

rical associations. But its effects in the good old days 
were wonderful and awe-inspiring. It was the author 
and creator of those flowers, now almost extinct, called 
grog-blossoms. You may see them depicted by the ca- 
ricaturists of the Rowlandson time, but they survived 
until well past the middle of the century. 

The outward and visible signs of rum were indeed 
various. First, there was the red and swollen nose ; next, 
the nose beautifully painted with grog-blossoms. It is an 
ancient nose, and is celebrated by the bacchanahan poet 
of Normandy, Olivier Basselin, in the fifteenth century. 
There was, next, the bottle nose in all its branches. I 
am uncertain, never having walked the hospitals, whether 
one is justified in classifying certain varieties of the 
bottle nose under one head, or whether each variety 
was a species by itself. All these noses, with the red and 
puffy cheeks, the thick lips, the double chins, the swell- 
ing, aldermanic corporation, and the gouty feet, in list 
and slippers, meant Eum — Great God Rum. These 
symptoms are no longer to be seen. Therefore, Great 
God Rum is either deposed, or he hath but few wor- 
shippers, and those half-hearted. 

The decay of the Great God Rum, and the Great 
Goddess Gin his consort, is marked in many other ways. 
Formerly, the toper half filled a thick, short rummerwith 
spirit, and poured upon it an equal quantity of water. 
Mr. Weller's theory of drink was that it should be 
equal. The modern toper goes to a bar, gets half a 
wineglass of Scotch whisky, and pours upon it a pint 



170 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

of Apollinaris water. The ancient drank his grog hot, 
with lemon and sugar, and sometimes spice. This 
made a serious business of the nightly grog. The 
modern takes his cold, even with ice, and without any 
addition of lemon. Indeed, he squashes his lemon 
separately, and drinks the juice in Apollinaris, without 
any spirit at all — a thing abhorrent to his ancestor. 

Again, there are preparations of a crafty and cryptic 
character, once greatly in favour, and now clean for- 
gotten, or else fallen into a pitiable contempt, and 
doomed to a siumbling, halt, and broken-winged exist- 
ence. Take, for instance, the punch-bowl. Fifty 
years ago it was no mere ornament for the sideboard 
and the china cabinet. It was a thin" to be brought 
forth and filled with a fragrant mixture of rum, brandy, 
and cura9oa, lemon, hot water, sugar, grated nutmeg, 
cloves, and cinnamon. The preparation of the bowl 
was as much a labour of love as that of a claret cup, its 
degenerate successor. The ladles were beautiful works 
of art in silver — where are those ladles now, and what 
purpose do they serve ? -Shrub, again — rum shrub — is 
there any living man who now calls for shrub .? You 
may still see it on the shelf of an old-fashioned inn ; you 
may even see the announcement that it is for sale 
painted on door-posts, but no man regardeth it. I 
beheve that it was supposed to possess valuable medi- 
cinal properties, the nature of which I forget. Again, 
there was purl — early purl. Once there was a club in 
the neiu;hbourhood of Covent Garden, which existed for 



THE TAVERN 171 

the purpose of arising betimes, and drinking purl before 
breakfast. Or there was dog's-nose. Gentle reader, 
you remember the rules for making dog's-nose. They 
were explained at a now famous meeting of the Brick 
Lane Branch of the Grand Junction Ebenezer Temper- 
ance Association. Yet I doubt whether dog's-nose is 
still in favour. Again, there was copus — is the making 
of copus- cup still remembered ? There was bishop : it 
was a kind of punch, made of port wine instead of rum, 
and was formerly much consumed at the suppers of un- 
dergraduates ; it was remarkable for its power of mak- 
ing men's faces red and their voices thick ; it also made 
them feel as if their legs and arms, and every part of 
them, were filled out and distended, as with twice the 
usual quantity of blood. These were, no doubt, valuable 
qualities, considered medicinally, yet bishop is no longer 
in demand. Mulled ale is still, perhaps, cultivated. 
They used to have pots made for the purpose of warm- 
ing the ale : these were long and shaped like an extin- 
guisher, so that the heat of the fire played upon a large 
surface, and warmed the beer quickly. When it was 
poured out, spice was added, and perhaps sugar, and no 
doubt a dash of brandy. Negus, a weak compound of 
sherry and warm water, used to be exhibited at dancing 
parties, but is now, I should think, unknown save by 
name. I do not speak of currant gin, damson brandy, 
or cherry brandy, because one or two such preparations 
are still produced. Nor need we consider British wines, 
now almost extinct. Yet in country towns one may 



172 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

here and there find shops where they provide for tastes 
still simple — the cowslip, delicate and silky to the palate ; 
the ginger, full of flavour and of body ; the red currant, 
rich and sweet — a ladies' wine ; the gooseberry, possess- 
ing all the finer qualities of the grape of Epernay ; the 
raisin, with fine Tokay flavour ; or the raspberry, full of 
bouquet and of beeswing. But their day is passed — the 
British wines are, practically, made no more. All these 
drinks, once so lovingly prepared and so tenderly che- 
rished, are now as much forgotten as the toast in the nut- 
brown ale, or the October humming ale, or the mead 
drunk from the gold-rimmed horn — they still drink 
something out of a gold-rimmed horn in the Hall of 
Corpus Christi, Cambridge ; or the lordly ' ypocras ' 
wherewith Sir Richard Whittington entertained his 
Sovereign, what day he concluded the banquet by 
burning the King's bonds ; or the once-popular mixture 
of gin and noyau ; or the cup of hot saloop from the 
stall in Covent Garden, or on the Fleet Bridge. 

The Tavern ! We can hardly understand how large 
a place it filled in the lives of our forefathers, who did 
not live scattered about in suburban villas, but over 
their shops and offices. When business was over, all of 
every class repaired to the Tavern. Dr. Johnson spent 
the evenings of his last years wholly at the Tavern ; 
the lawyer, the draper, the grocer, the bookseller, even 
the clergy, all spent their evenings at the Tavern, going 
home in time for supper with their families. You may 
see the kind of Tavern life in any small country town 



174 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



to this day, where the shopkeepers assemble every 
evening to smoke and talk together. The Tavern was 
far more than a modern club, because the tendency of 
a club is to become daily more decorous, while the 
Tavern atmosphere of freedom and the equahty of all 
comers prevented the growth of artificial and conventional 
restraints. Something of the Tavern life is left still in 
London ; but not much. The substantial tradesman is 
no longer resident ; there are no longer any clubs which 
meet at Taverns ; and the old inns, with their sanded 





SIGN' OF THE BWAN WITH TWO NECKS, 
CARTER lANE 



SIGN' OF THE BOLT-IN-TUN, 
FLEET STREET 



floors and great fireplaces, are nearly all gone. The 
Swan with Two Necks, the Belle Sauvage, the Tabard, 
the George and Vulture, the Bolt-in-Tun — they have 
either ceased their existence, or tlieir names call forth 
no more associations of good company and good songs. 
The Dog and Duck, the Temple of Flora, Apollo's Gar- 
dens, the Bull in the Pound, the Blue Lion of Gray's 
Lm Lane — what memories linger round tliese names ? 
What man is now living who can tell us where they 
were ? 



CHAPTEE Xn. 

LN" CLUB- JlSB CARD-LAND. 

Club-land Tvas a comparatively small country, peopled 
by a most exclusive race. There were twenty-five clubs 
in all,^ and, as many men had more than one club, and 
the average membership was less than a thousand, 
there were not more than 20,000 men altogether who 
belonged to clubs. There are now at least 120,000, 
with nearly a hundred clubs, to which almost any man 
might belong. Besides these, there are now about sixty 
second-class clubs, together with a great many clubs 
which existfor special purposes — betting and racing clubs, 
whist clubs, gambling clubs, Press clubs, and so forth. 

Of the now extinct clubs may be mentioned the 
Alfred and the Clarence, which were literary clubs. 
The Clarence was founded by Campbell on the ashes of 
the extinct Literary Club, which had been dissolved in 
consequence of internal dissensions. The Athenaeum had 

* The following is the complete list of clubs, taken from the Keir Monthly 
Magazine of the year 1835 : — Albion, Alfred, Arthur's, Athenaeum, Boodle's, 
Brookes's, Carlton, Clarence, Cocoa-tree, Crockford's, Garrick, Graham's, 
Guards', Orieutal, Oxford and Cambridge, Portland, Royal Naval, Travellers, 
Union, United Service, Junior Umred Service, University, West Indian, 
White's, Windham. 



176 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



the character which it still preserves ; one of the few 
things in this club complained of by the members of 
1837 was the use of gas in the dining-room, which pro- 
duced an atmosphere wherein, it was said, no animals 
ungifted with copper lungs could long exist. The Gar- 
rick Club was exclusively theatrical. The Oriental was, 




OXFORD AND CiMBEIDGE CLUB, PALI, MALL 

of course, famous for curry and Madeira, the Union 
had a sprinkling of City men in it, the United University 
was famous for its iced punch, and the Windham was 
the first club which allowed strangers to dine within its 
walls. Speaking generally, no City men at all, nor any 
who were connected in any way with trade, were ad- 



i 



IN CLUB- AND CARD-LAND 



177 



mitted into the clubs of London. A barrister, a phy- 
sician, or a clergyman might be elected, and, of course, 
all men in the Services ; but a merchant, an attorney, a 
surgeon, an architect, might knock in vain. 

The club subscription was generally six guineas a 
year, and if we may judge by the fact that you could 
dine off the joint at tlie Carlton for a shilling, tlie clubs 
were much cheaper than they are now. They were 




UNITED UNIVEIISITV CLUB, PALL M-\LL 

also quite as dull. Thackeray describes tlie dulness of 
the club, the pride of belonging to it, the necessity of 
having at least one 2:ood club, the habitues of the card- 
room, the talk, and the scandal. But the new clubs of 
our day are larger : their members come from a more 
extended area ; there are few young City men who have 
not their club ; and it is not at all necessary to know a 
man because he is a member of your club And when 



178 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

one contrasts the cold and silent coffee-room of the new 
great club, where the men glare at each other, with the 
bright and cheerful Tavern, where every man talked 
with his neighbour, and the song went round, and the 
great kettle bubbled on the hearth, one feels that civili- 
sation has its losses. 

We have our gambling clubs still. From time to 
time til ere comes a rumour of high play, a scandal, or 
an action in the High Court of Justice for the recovery 
of one's character. Baccarat is played all night by the 
young men ; champagne is flowing for their refresh- 
ment, and sometimes a few hundreds are lost by some 
young fellow who can ill afford it. But these things 
are small and insignificant compared with the gambling 
club of fifty years ago. 

He who speaks of gambling in the year Thirty-seven, 
speaks of Crockford's. Everything at Crockford's was 
magnificent. The subscription was ten guineas a year, 
in return for which the members had the ordinary club - 
and coffee-rooms providing food and wine at the usual 
club charges — these were on the ground floor — and the 
run of the gambling-rooms every night, to which they 
could introduce guests and friends. These rooms were 
on the first floor : they consisted of a saloon, in which 
there was served every night a splendid supper, with 
wines of the best, free to all visitors. Crockford paid 
his chef 3^ thousand guineas a year, and his assistant five 
hundred, and his cellar was reputed to be worth 70,000/. 
There were two card-rooms, one in which whist, ^carte, 



IN CLUB- AND CARD-LAND 



T79 



and all other games were played, and a second smaller 
room, in which hazard alone was played. Every night 
at eleven the banker and proprietor himself took his seat 
at his desk in a corner ; his croupier, sitting opposite to 
him in a high chair, declared the game, paid the winners, 
and raked in the money. Crockford's ' Spiders ' — that 
is, the gentlemen who had the run of the establishment 
under certain implied conditions — introduced their 




CROCKFORD S, ST. JAilES S STREET 



friends to the supper and the champagne first, and to the 

hazard-room next. At two in the morning the doors were 

closed, and nobody else was admitted ; but the play 

went on all night long. Crockford not only held the 

bank, but was ready to advance money to those who 

lost, and outside the card-room treated for reversionary 

interests, post-obits, and other means for raising the 

wind. The e-ame was what is called ' French Hazard,' 
16-2 ^ 



i8o FIFTY YEARS AGO 

in which the players play against the bank. Thousands 
were every night lost and won. As much as a million 
of money has been known to change hands in a single 
night, and the banker was ready to meet any stake 
offered. Those who lost borrowed more in order to con- 
tinue the game, and lost that as well. But Crockford 
seems never to have been accused of any dishonourable 
practices. He trusted to the chances of the table, which 
were, of course, in his favour. In his ledgers — where 
are they now ? — he was accustomed to enter the 
names of those who borrowed of him by initials or a 
number. He began life as a small fishmonger just 
within Temple Bar, and, fortunately for himself, dis- 
covered that he was endowed with a rare talent for 
rapid mental arithmetic, of which he made good use in 
betting and card-playing. The history of his gradual 
rise to greatness from a beginning so unpromising 
would be interesting, but perhaps the materials no 
longer exist. He was a tall and corpulent man, lame, 
who never acquired the art of speaking English cor- 
rectly, — a thing which his noble patrons — the Duke of 
WelHngton was a member of his club — passed over in 
him. 

Everybody went to Crockford's. Everybody played 
there. That a young fellow just in possession of a great 
estate should drop a few thousands in a single night's 
play was not considered a thing worthy of remark ; they 
all did it. We remember how Disraeli's ' Young Duke ' 
went on playing cards all night and all next day — was 



IN CLUB- AND CARD-LAND i8i 

it not all the next night as well? — till he and his com- 
panions were up to their knees in cards, and the man 
who was waiting on them was fain to lie down and sleep 
for half an hour. The passion of gambling — it is one 
of those other senses outside the five old elementary 
endowments — possessed everybody. Cards played a far 
more important part in hfe than they do now ; the 
evening rubber was played in every quiet house ; the 
club card-tables were always crowded ; for manly youth 
there were the fiercer joys of lansquenet, loo, vingt-et-un, 
and ecarte ; for the domestic circle there were the whist- 
table and the round table, and at the latter were played 
a quantity of games, such as Pope Joan, Commerce, 
Speculation, and I know not what, all for money, and 
all depending for their interest on the hope of winning 
and the fear of losing. Family gambling is gone. K 
in a genteel suburban villa one was to propose a round 
game, and call for the Pope Joan board, there would be 
a smile of wonder and pity. As well ask for a glass of 
negus, or call for the Caledonians at a dance ! 

Scandals there were, of course. Men gambled away 
the whole of their great estates ; they loaded their 
property with burdens in a single night which would 
keep their children and their grandchildren poor. 
They grew desperate, and became hawks on the look- 
out for pigeons ; they cheated at the card-table (read 
the famous case of Lord De Eos in this very year) ; they 
were always being detected and expelled, and so could 
no more show their faces at any place where gentlemen 



i82 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

congregated ; and sank from Crockford's to the cheaper 
hells, such as the cribs where the tradesmen used to 
gamble, those frequented by City clerks, by gentlemen's 
servants, and even those of the low French and Italians. 
They were illegal cribs, and informers were always get- 
ting money by causing the proprietors to be indicted. 
It was said of Thurtell, after he was hanged for murder- 
ing Weare, that he had offered to murder eight Irish- 
men, who had informed against these hells, for the 
consideration of 40/. a head. When they were suffered 
to proceed, however, the proprietors always made their 
fortunes. No doubt their descendants are now country 
gentry, and the green cloth has long since been folded 
up and put away in the lumber-room, with the rake 
and the croupier's green shade and his chaii, and the 
existence of these relics is forgotten. 




c^ ^. ^rC^ 



a<^ q1^ 



CHAPTER XIII. 

WITH THE WITS. 

The ten years of the Thirties are a period concerning 
whose literary history the ordinary reader knows next 
to nothing, let a good deal that has survived for fifty 
years, and promises to live longer, was accomplished in 
that period. Dickens, for example, began his career in the 
year 1837 with his ' Sketches by " Boz " ' and the ' Pick- 
wick Papers ; ' Lord Lytton,then Mr. Lytton Biilwer, had 
already before that year published five novels, including 
'Paul Chfford' and 'The Last Days of Pompeii.' Tenny- 
son had already issued the ' Poems, by Two Brothers,' 
and ' Poems chiefly Lyrical.' Disraeli had written 
' The Young Duke,' ' Vivian Grey,' and ' Venetia.' 
Browning had published ' Paracelsus ' and ' Strafford ; * 
Marryat began in 1834 ; Carlyle published the ' Sartor 
Resartus ' in 1832. But one must not estimate a period 
by its beginners. All these writers belong to the fol- 
lowing thirty years of the century. If we look for 
those who were flourishing — that is, those who were 
producing their best work — it will be found that this 
decade was singularly poor. The principal name is 



1 84 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

that of Hood. There were also Hartley Coleridge, Doiicflas 
Jerrold, Procter, Sir Archibald Alison, Theodore Hook, 
G. P. E. James, Charles Knight, Sir Henry Taylor, 
Milman, Ebenezer Elliott, Harriet Martinea.ii, James 
Montgomery, Talfourd, Henry Brougham, Lady Bles- 




CHARLE8 KNIGHT 
CFrom a Photograph by Hnghes & Mullius, Eegina House, Ryde, Isle of Wight) 

sington, Harrison AinsAvorth, and some others of lesser 
note. This is not a very imposing array. On the other 
hand, nearly all the great writers whom we associate 
with the first thirty j^ears of the century were living, 
though their best Avork was done. After sixty, I take 
it, the hand of the master may still work with the old 




'^^^^-/^KMv^^^.^^^NK'-'A^^v^f^^. 




WITH THE WITS 



185 



cunning, but his designs will be no longer new or bold. 
Wordsworth was sixty in 1830. and, though he lived 
for twenty years longer, and published the 'Yarrow 
Eevisited,' and, I think, some of his ' Sonnets,' he hardly 
added to his fame. Southey was four years younger. 
He published his ' Doctor ' and ' Essays ' in this decade, 
but his best work was done already. Scott died in 1832 ; 
Coleridge died in 1834; Byron was already dead ; James 
Hogg died in 1835 ; 
Felicia Hemans in the 
same year ; Tom Moore 
w^as a gay young fellow 
of fifty in 1830, the 
year in which his life 
of Lord Byron appear- 
ed. He did very little 
afterwards. Campbell 
was two years older 
than Moore, and he, 
too, had exhausted 




^'^:. (( "^ 
^ 



Eogers, older 



BOBERT SOUTHEY 



himself. 

than any of them, had entirely concluded his poetic 
career. It is wonderful to think that he began to 
write in 1783 and died in 1855. Beckford, whose 
' Yathek ' appeared in 1786, was living until 1844. 
AmouCT others who were still living in 1837 were James 
and Horace Smith, Wilson Croker, Miss Edgeworth, 
Mrs. Trollope, Lucy Aikin, Miss Opie (who lived to be 
eighty-five), Jane Porter (prematurely cut ofi" at seventy- 



r86 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



four), and Harriet Lee (whose immortal work, the 
' Errors of Innocence,' appeared in 1786, when she was 
already thirty) lived on till 1852, when she was ninety- 
six. Bowles, that excellent man, was not yet seventy, 
and meant to live for twenty years longer. De Quincey 
was fifty-two in 1837, Christopher North was in full 
vio-our, Thomas Love Peacock, who published his first 




THOMAS MOORE 



novel in 1810, was destined to produce a last, equally 
good, in 18G0; Landor, born in 1775, was not to die 
until 1864; Leigh Hunt, who in 1837 was fifty-three 
years of age, belongs to the time of Byron. John Keble, 
whose ' Christian Year ' was published in 1827, was 
forty-four in 1837 ; 'L. E. L.' died in 1838. In America, 
Washington Irving, Emerson, Channing, Bryant, Whittier, 
and Longfellow, make a good group. In France, Chateau- 



WITH THE WITS 



187 



briand, Lamartine, Victor Hugo, Beranger, Alfred de 
Musset, Scribe, and Dumas were all writing, a group 
much stronger than our English team. 

It is difficult to understand, at first, that between 
the time of Scott, Wordsworth, Byron, and Keats, and 
tliat of Dickens, Thackeray, Marryat, Lever, Tennyson, 




' VATHEK BECKFORD 

(From a Medallion) 



Browning, and Carlyle, there existed this generation 
of wits, most of them almost forgotten. Those, how- 
ever, who consider the men and women of the Thirties 
have to deal, for the most part, with a literature 
that is third-rate. This kind becomes dreadfully flat 
and stale when it has been out for fifty years ; the 
dullest, flattest, dreariest reading that can be found on 



1 88 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

the shelves in tlie sprightly novel of Society, written in 
the Thirties. 

A blight had fallen upon novels and their writers. 
The enormous success that Scott had achieved tempted 
hundreds to follow in his path, if that were possible. 




WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR 
(From a Photogi-aph by H. Watkins) 



It was not possible ; but this they could not know, be- 
cause nothing seems so easy to write as a novel, and no 
man, of tliose destined to fail, can understand in what 
respects his own work falls short of Scott's. That is 
the chief reason why he fails. Scott's success, however, 



WITH THE WITS 



189 



produced another effect. It greatly enlarged the num- 
ber of novel readers, and caused them to buy up eagerly 
anythmg new, in the hope of finding another Scott. 
Thus, about the year 1826 there were produced as many 
as 250 tliree- and four- volume novels a year — that is to 
say, about as many as were published in 1886, when 
the area of readers has been multiplied by ten. We 
are also told that nearly 
all these novels could com- 
mand a sale of 750 to 1,000 
each, while anything above 
the average would have a 
sale of 1,500 to 2,000. 
The usual price given for 
these novels was, we are 
also told, from 200/. to 300/. 
In that case the publishers 
must have had a happy and 
a prosperous time, netting 
splendid hauls. But I think 
that we must take these figures with considerable 
deductions. There were, as yet, no circulating libraries 
of any importance ; their place was supplied by 
book-clubs, to which the pubhshers chiefly looked for 
the purchase of their books. But one cannot believe 
that the book-clubs would take copies of all the rubbish 
that came out. Some of these novels I have read ; 
some of them actually stand on my shelves ; and I de- 
clare that anything more dreary and unprofitable it is 




BALPH WALDO EMEKSON 



190 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



difficult to imacfine. At last there was a revolt : the 
public would staud this kind of stufT no longer. Down 
droj)ped the circulation of the novels. Instead of 2,000 
copies subscribed, the dismayed publisher now read 50, 
and the whole host of novelists vanished like a swarm 
of midges. At the same time poetry went down too. 




i 



LOED BYEON 



The drop in poetry was even more terrible than that 
of novels. Suddenly, and without any warning, the 
people of Great Britain left off reading poetry. To be 
sure, they had been flooded with a prodigious quantity 
of trash. One anonymous ' j^opular poet,' whose name 
will never now be recovered, received 100/f. for his last 
poem from a publisher who thought, no doubt, that the 



WITH THE WITS 



191 



' boom ' was going to last. Of this popular poet's work 
he sold exactly fifty copies. Another, a ' humorous ' bard, 
who also received a large sum for his immortal poem, 
showed in the unhappy publisher's books no more than 
eighteen copies sold. This was too ridiculous, and from 




„'ER SCOTT 



that day to this the trade side of poetry has remained 
under a cloud. That of novelist has, fortunately for some, 
beenredeemed from contempt by the enormous success of 
Dickens, Thackeray, George Eliot, and by the solid, though 
substantial, success of the lesser lights. Poets have now 
to pay for the publication of their own works, but nove- 



192 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

lists — some of them — command a price ; those, namely, 
who do not have to pay for the production of their works. 

The popular taste, thus cloyed with novels and 
poetry, turned to books on popular science, on statistics, 
on health, and on travel. Barry Cornwall's * Life of 
Kean,' Campbell's ' Life of Siddons,' the Lives of Sale, 
Sir Thomas Picton, and Lord Exmouth, for example, 
were all well received. So Eoss's ' Arctic Seas,' Lamar- 
tine's ' Pilgrimage,' Macfarlane's ' Travels in the East,' 
Holman's ' Pound the World,' and Quin's 'Voyage down 
the Danube,' all commanded a sale of 1,000 copies 
each at least Works of religion, of course, always suc- 
ceed, if they are written with due regard to the rehgious 
leanincf of the moment. It shows how reliojious fash- 
ions change when we find that the copyright of the 
works of Eobert Hall realised 4,000/. and that of Charles 
Simeon's books 5,000Z. ; while of the Eev. Alexander 
Fletcher's ' Book of Family Devotions,' published at 24^., 
2,000 copies were sold on the day of publication. I 
dare say the same thing would happen again to-day if 
another Mr. Fletcher were to hit upon another happy 
thought in the way of a rehgious book. 

I think that one of the causes of the decay of trade 
as regards poetry and fiction may have been the bad- 
ness of the annuals. You will find in any old-fashioned 
library copies of the ' Keepsake,' the ' Forget-me-Not,' 
the ' Book of Beauty,' ' Flowers of Loveliness,' Finden's 
* Tableaux,' 'The Book of Gems,' and others of that now 
extinct tribe. They were beautifully printed on the 



WITH THE WITS 



193 



finest paper ; they were illustrated with the most lovely 
steel engravings, the like of which could not now be 




A FASHIONABLE BEAUTY OF 1837 
(By A. E. Clialon, R.A.) 



had at any price; they were bound in brown and 
crimson watered silk, most fascinationg to look upon ; and 



194 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

they were published at a guinea. As for their contents, 
they were, to begin with, written ahnost entirely by 
ladies and gentlemen with handles to their names, each 
number containing in addition two or three papers by 
commoners — mere literary commoners — just to give a 
flavouring of style. In the early Thirties it was fashion- 
able for lords and ladies to dash off these trifles. Byron 
was a gentleman ; Shelley was a gentleman ; nobody 
else, to be sure, among the poets and wits was a gentle- 
man — yet if Byron and Shelley condescended to bid for 
fame and bays, why not Lord Eeculver, Lady Juliet de 
Dagenham, or the Hon. Lara Clonsilla ? I have before 
me the 'Keepsake' for the year 1831. Among the 
authors are Lord Morpeth, Lord Nugent, Lord Por- 
chester. Lord John Eussell, the Hon. George Agar Ellis, 
the Hon. Henry Liddell, the Hon. Charles Phipps, the 
Hon. Robert Craddock, and the Hon. Grantley Berkeley. 
Among the ladies are the Countess of Blessington, 
'L. E. L.,' and Agnes Strickland. Theodore Hook supplies 
the professional part. The illustrations are engraved 
from pictures and drawings by Eastlake, Corbould, 
Westall, Turner, Smirke, Flaxman, and other great 
artists. The result, from the literary point of view, is a 
collection much lower in point of interest and ability 
than the worst number of the worst shilling magazine of 
the present day. I venture to extract certain immortal 
lines contributed by Lord John Russell, who is not gene- 
rally known as a poet. They are ' written at Kinneil, 
the residence of the late Mr. Dugald Stewart.' 



WITH THE WITS 195 

To distant worlds a guide amid the night, 
To nearer orbs the source of life and light ; 
Each star resplendent on its radiant throne 
Gilds other systems and supports its own. 
Thus we see Stewart, in his fame reclined, 
Enlighten all the universe of mind ; 
To some for wonder, some for joy appear, 
Admired when distant and beloved when near. 
'Twas he gave rules to Fancy, grace to Thought, 
Taught Virtue's laws, and practised what he taught. 

Dear me ! Something similar to the last line one 
remembers written by an earlier bard. In the same 
way Terence has been accused of imitating the old 
Eton Latin Grammar. 

Somewhere about the year ]837 the world began 
to kick at the ' Keepsakes,' and they gradually got ex- 
tinguished. Then the lords and the countesses put 
away their verses and dropped into prose, and, to the 
infinite loss of mankind, wrote no more until editors of 
great monthlies, anxious to show a hst of illustrious 
names, began to ask them again. 

As for the general literature of the day, there must 
have been a steady demand for new works of all kinds, 
for it was estimated that in 1836 there were no fewer 
than four thousand persons living by literary work. Most 
of them, of course, must have been simple publishers' 
hacks. But seven hundred of them in London were 
journalists, kl the present day there are said to be in 
London alone fourteen thousand men and women who 
live by writing. And of this number I shoukl think 
til at thirteen thousand are in some way or other con- 



196 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

nected with journalism. Publishers' hacks still exist — 
that is to say, the unhappy men who, without genius 
or natural aptitude, or the art of writing pleasantly, 
are eternally engaged in compihng, steahng, arranging, 
and putting together books which maybe palmed off upon 
an uncritical pubhc for prize books and presents. But 
they are far fewer in proportion than they were, and 
perhaps the next generation may live to see them extinct. 
What did they write, this regiment of 3,300 
litterateurs ? Novehsts, as we have learned, had fallen 

_.. upon evil times ; poetry was 

^^On^ what it still continues to be, 

^1^ ^^ a drug in the market ; but 

there was the whole range 
of the sciences, there were 
morals, theology, education, 
travels, biography, history, 
the literature of Art in all 
its branches, archaeology, an- 

(From the Picture by Sir T. Lawrence) ^'^^^ ^^^ modem lit^ratUrC, 

criticism, and a hundred other things. Yet, making 
allowance for everything, I cannot but think that the 
3,300 must have had on the whole an idle and un- 
profitable time. However, some books of the year may 
be recorded. First of all, in the ' Annual Register ' for 
1837 there appears a poem by Alfred Tennyson. I 
have copied a portion of it : — 

Oh ! that 'twere possible, 

After long grief and pain, 
To find the arms of my true love 

Round me once again ! 



LORD TENNYSON AS A YOUNG MAN 



WITH THE WITS 197 

When I was wont to meet her 
In the silent woody places 

Of the land that gave me birth, 
We stood tranced in long embraces, 
JMixt with kisses sweeter, sweeter 

Than anything on earth. 

A shadow flits before me — 

Not thee but like to thee. 
Ah God ! that it were possible 

For one short hour to see 
The souls we loved that they might tell U3 

What, and where they be. 

It leads me forth at evening, 

It lightly winds and steals. 
In a cold white robe before me, 

When all my spirit reels 
At the shouts, the leagues of lights. 

And the roaring of the wheels. 

Then the broad light glares and beats, 
And the sunk eye flits and fleets, 

And will not let me be. 
I loathe the squares and streets 
And the faces that one meets. 

Hearts with no love for me. 
Always I long to creep 
To some still cavern deep. 
And to weep and weep and weep 

My whole soul out to thee. 

Books, indeed, there were in plenty. Lady Bles- 
sington produced her ' Victims of Society ' and ' Sunday 
at the Zoo ; ' Mr. Lytton Bulwer his ' Duchesse de la 
Valliere,' ' Ernest Maltravers,' and ' Athens, its Else 
and Fall ; ' Miss Mitford her ' Country Stories ; ' Cottle 
his ' Eecollections of Coleridge ; ' Harrison Ainsworth, 
' Crichton ; ' Disraeli, ' Venetia ; ' Talfourd, ' The Life 



198 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

and Letters of Charles Lamb ; ' Babbage, a * Bridgwater 
Treatise ; ' Hool^, ' Jack Brag ; ' Haynes Bay ley, liis 
* Weeds of Witchery ' — a thing as much forgotten as 
the weeds in last year's garden ; James, his ' Attila ' 
and ' Louis XIV. ; ' Miss Martineau, her ])ook on 
'American Society.' I find, not in the book, which I 
have not read, but in a review of it, iwo stories, which 
I copy. One is of an American traveller who had been 
to Rome, and said of it, ' Eome is a very fme city, sir, 
but its public buildings are out of repair.' The other 
is the following : " Few men,' said the preacher in his 
sermon, ' when they build a house, remember that 
there must some day be a coffin taken downstairs.' 
' Ministers,' said a lady who had been present, ' have 
got into the strangest way of choosing subjects. True, 
wide staircases are a great convenience, but Christian 
ministers might find better subjects for their discourses 
than narrow staircases.' 

In addition to the above. Hartley Coleridge wrote 
the ' Lives of Northern Worthies ; ' the complete poeti- 
cal works of Southey appeared — he himself died at 
the beginning of 1842 ; Dion Boucicault produced his 
first play, being then fifteen years of age ; Carlyle 
brought out his 'French Eevolution ; ' Lockhart his 
' Life of Scott ; ' Martin Tupper the first series of the 
' Proverbial Philosophy ; ' Hallam his ' Literature of 
Europe ; ' there were the usual travels in Arabia, 
Armenia, Italy, and Ireland ; with, no doubt, the annual 
avalanche of sermons, pamphlets, and the rest. Above 



WITH THE WITS 199 

all, however, it must be remembered that to this time 
belong the ' Sketches by " Boz " ' (1836) and the 'Pick- 
wick Papers ' (1837-38). Of the latter, the Athenceum 
not unwisely remarked that they were made up of 
* three pounds of Smollett, three ounces of Sterne, a 
handful of Hook, a dash of a grammatical Pierce Egan ; 
the incidents at pleasure, served with an original sauce 

piquante We earnestly hope and trust that 

nothing we have said will tend to refine Boz.' One 
could hardly expect a critic to be ready at once to 
acknowledge that here was a genius, original, totally 
unlike any of his predecessors, who knew the great art 
of drawing from life, and depicting nothing but what 
he knew. As for Thackeray, he was still in the chrysalis 
stage, though his Hkeness appears with those of the 
contributors to Fraser's Majazine in the portrait 
group of Fraserians published in 1839. His first 
independently published book, I think, was the ' Paris 
Sketch Book,' which was not issued until the year 
1840. 

Here, it will be acknowledged, is not a record to be 
quite ashamed of, with Carlyle, Talfourd, Hallam, and 
Dickens to adorn and illustrate the year. After all, it 
is a great thing for any year to add one enduring book 
to English Literature, and it is a great deal to show so 
many works which are still read and remembered. 
Lytton's ' Ernest Maltravers,' though not his best novel, 
is still read by some ; Talfourd's ' Charles Lamb ' re- 
mains ; Disraeli's ' Venetia ; ' Lockhart's ' Life of Scott ' 



FIFTY YEARS AGO 



is the best biography of the novehst and poet ; Carlyle's 
' French Eevokition ' shows no si^n of being forgotten. 
Between the first and the fiftietli years of Victoria's 
reign there arose and flourished and died a new gene- 
ration of great men. Dickens, Thackeray, Lytton, in 
his later and better style ; George Eliot, Charles Eeade, 
George Meredith, Nathaniel Hawthorne, stand in the very 
front rank of novelists ; in the second line are Charles 







Kingsley, Mrs. Gaskell, Lever, Trollope, and a few living 
men and women. Tennyson, Browning, Swinburne, 
Matthew Arnold, are the new poets. Carlyle, Freeman, 
Froude, Stubbs, Green, Lecky, Buckle, have founded 
a new school of history ; Maurice has broadened the 
old theology ; Darwin, Huxley, Tyndall, Lockyer, and 
many others have advanced the boundaries of science ; 
philology has become one of the exact sciences ; a 
great school of pohtical economy has arisen, flourished. 



WITH THE WITS 201 

and decayed. As to the changes that have come upon 
the hterature of the country, the new points of view, 
the new creeds, these belong to another chapter. 

There has befallen literature of late years a grievous, 
even an irreparable blow. It has lost the salon. There 
are no longer grandes dames de par le monde^ who 




CHAELES DAEWIN 



attract to their drawing-rooms the leaders and the 
lesser Hghts of literature ; there are no longer, so far 
as I know, any places at all, even any clubs, whicli are 
recognised centres of literature ; there are no longer 
any houses where one will be sure to find great talkers, 
and to hear them talking all nicrht loncf. There are no 
longer any great talkers — that is to say, many men 



202 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

there are who talk well, but there are no Sydney Smiths 
or Macanlays, and in houses where the Sydney Smith 
of the day would go for his talk, he would not be 
encouraged to talk much after midnight. In the same 
way, there are clubs, like the Athenaium and the Savile, 
where men of letters are among the members, but they 
do not constitute the members, and they do not give 
altogether its tone to the club. 

Fifty years ago there were two houses which, each 
in its own way, were recognised centres of literature. 
Every man of letters went to Gore House, which was 
open to all ; a,nd every man of letters who could get 
there went to Holland House. 

The former establishment was presided over by the 
Countess of Blessington, at this time a widow, still 
young and still attractive, though beginning to be 
burdened with the care of an estabhshment too ex- 
pensive for her means. She was the author of a good 
many novels, now almost forgotten — it is odd how well 
one knows the name of Lady Blessington, and how Httle 
is generally known about her history, literary or per- 
sonal — and she edited every year one of the ' Keep- 
sakes ' or ' Forget-me-Nots.' From certain indications, 
the bearing of which her biographer, Mr. Madden, did 
not seem to understand, I gather that her novels did 
not prove to the publishers the literary success which 
they expected, and I also infer — from the fact that she 
was always changing them — that a dinner at Gore 
House and the society of all the wits after dinner were 



WITH THE WITS 



203 



not always attractions strong enough to loosen their 
purse-strings. This lady, whose maiden name was 
Power, was of an Irish family, her father being engaged, 
when he was not shooting rebels, in unsuccessful trade. 
Her hfe was adventurous and also scandalous. She 
was married at sixteen to a Captain Farmer, from whom 
she speedily separated, and came over to London, where 
she lived for some years — her biographer does not ex- 
plain liow she got money — a grass widow. When Lord 







HOLLAND HOUSE 



Blessington lost his wife, and Mrs. Farmer lost her 
husband — the gallant Captain got drunk, and fell out 
of a window — they were married, and went abroad 
travelhng in great state, as an English milor of those 
days knew how to travel, with a train of lialf-a-dozen 
carriages, his own cook and valet, the Countess's 
women, a whole hatterie de cuisine, a quantity of furni- 
ture, couriers, and footmen, and his own great carriage. 
With them went the Count d'Orsay, then about two- 



204 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

and-twenty, and young Charles Mathews, then about 
twenty, a protege of Lord Blessington, who was a friend 
and patron of the drama. 

After Lord Blessington died it was arranged that 
Count d'Orsay should marry his daughter. But the 
Count separated from his wife a week or two after the 
wedding, and returned to the widow, whom he never 
afterwards left, always taking a lodging near her house, 
and forming part of her household. The Countess 
d'Orsay, one need not explain, did not visit her step- 
mother at Gore House. 

Here, however, you would meet Tom Moore, the 
two Bulwers, Campbell, Talfourd, James and Horace 
Smith, Landseer, Theodore Hook, Disraeli the elder and 
the younger, Eogers, Washington Irving, N. P. Willis, 
Marryat, Macready, Charles Dickens, Albert Smith, 
Forster, Walter Savage Laudor, and, in short, nearly 
every one who had made a reputation, or was likely to 
make it. Hither came also Prince Louis Napoleon, 
in whose fortunate star Count d'Orsay always firmly 
beheved. The conversation was lively, and the even- 
ings were prolonged. As for ladies, there were few 
ladies who went to Gore House. Doubtless they had 
their reasons. The outer circle, so to speak, consisted 
of such men as Lord Abinger, Lord Durham, Lord 
Strangford, Lord Porchester, Lord Nugent, writers and 
poetasters who contributed their illustrious names and 
their beautiful productions to Lady Blessington's ' Keep- 
sakes.' Thackeray was one of the ' intimates ' at Gore 



y^^ 




WITH THE WITS 205 

House, and when the crash came in 1849, and the 
place was sold up by the creditors, it is on record that 
the author of ' Vanity Fair ' was the only person who 
showed emotion. ' Mr. Thackeray also came,' wrote the 
Countess's valet to his mistress, who had taken refuge 
in Paris, ' and he went away with tears in his eyes ; he 
is perhaps the only person I have seen really affected 
at your departure.' In 1837 he was twenty-six years 
of age, but he had still to wait for twelve years before 
he was to take his real place in literature, and even then 
and until the day of his death there were many who 
could not understand his greatness. 

As regards Lady Blessington, her morals may have 
been deplorable, but there must have been something 
singularly attractive about her manners and conversa- 
tion. It is not by a stupid or an unattractive woman 
that such success as hers was attained. Her novels, so 
far as I have been able to read them, show no remark- 
able ability, and her portrait shows amiability rather 
than cleverness ; yet she must have been both clever 
and amiable to get so many clever men around her and 
to fix them, to make them come again, come often, and 
regard her drawing-room and her society as altogether 
charming, and to write such verses upon her as the 
following : — 

Mild WDberforce, by all beloved, 

Once owned this hallowed spot, 
Whose zealous eloquence improved 

The fettered Negro's lot, 



2o6 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

Yet here still slavery attacks 

Whom Blessington invites ; 
The chains from which he freed the blacks 

She rivets on the whites. 

The following lines are in another strain, more 
artificial, with a false ring, and curiously unlike any 
style of the present day. They are by N. P. Willis, 
who, in his ' Pencillings,' describes an evening at Gore 
House ; — 

I gaze upon a face as fair 

As ever made a lip of Heaven 
Falter amid its music — prayer : 

The first-lit star of summer even 
Springs scarce so softly on the eye, 

Nor grows with watching half so bright, 
Nor 'mid its sisters of the sky 

So seems of Heaven the dearest light. 
Men murmur where that shape is seen ; 
My youth's angelic dream was of that face and mien. 

Gore House was a place for men ; there was more 
than a touch of Bohemia in its atmosphere. The fair 
chatelaine distinctly did not belong to any noble house, 
though she was fond of talking of her ancestors ; the 
constant presence of Count d'Orsay, and the absence of 
Lady Harriet, his wife ; the coldness of ladies as regards 
the place ; the whispers and the open talk ; tliese things 
did not, perhaps, make the house less delightful, but 
they placed it outside society. 

Holland House, on the other hand, occupied a 
different position. The circle was wide and the hos- 
pitable doors were open to all who could procure an 
introduction ; but it was presided over by a lady the 



WITH THE WITS 207 

opposite to Lady Blessington in every respect. She 
ruled as well as reigned ; those who went to Holland 
House were made to feel her power. The Princess 
Marie Liechtenstein, in her book on Holland House, has 
given a long list of those who were to be found there 
between the years 1796 and 1840. Among them were 
Sydney Smith, Macaulay, Byron, 'Monk' Lewis, Lord 
Jeffrey, Lords Eldon, Thurlow, Brougham, and Lynd- 
hurst, Sir Humphry Davy, Count Eumford, Lords 
Aberdeen, Moira, and Macartney, Grattan, Curran, Sir 
Samuel Eomilly, Washington Irving, Tom Moore, 
Calonne, Lally Tollendal, Talleyrand, the Duke of 
Clarence, the Due d'Orleans, Metternich, Canova, the 
two Erskines, Madame de Stael, Lord John Eussell, and 
Lord Houghton. There was no such agreeable house 
in Europe as Holland House. 'There was no profes- 
sional claqueur ; no mutual puffing ; no exchanged 
support. There, a man was not unanimously applauded 
because he was known to be clever, nor was a woman 
accepted as clever because she was known to receive 
clever people.' 

The conditions of Hfe and society are so much 
changed that there can never again be another Holland 
House. For the first thing which strikes one who con- 
siders the history of this place, as well as Gore House, 
is that, though the poets, wits, dramatists, and novelists 
go to these houses, their wives do not. In these days 
a man who respects himself will not go to a house where 
his wife is not asked. Then, again, London is so much 



2o8 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

greater in extent, and people are so much scattered, that 
it would be difficult now to get together a circle con- 
sisting of literary people who lived near enough to 
frequent the house. And another thing : people no 
longer keep such late hours. They do not sit up talk- 
ing all night. That is, perhaps, because there are no 
wits to talk with ; but I do not know : I think that 
towards midnight the malice of Count d'Orsay in draw- 
ing out the absurd points in the guests, the rollicking 
fun of Tom Moore, or his sentimental songs, the repartee 
of James Smith, and the polished talk of Lytton Bulwer, 
all collar, cuff, diamond pin, and wavy hair, would have 
begun to pall upon me, and when nobody was taking 
any notice of so obscure an individual, I should have 
stolen down the stairs, and so out into the open air 
beneath the stars. For the wits were very witty, but 
they must have been very fatiguing. ' Quite enough of 
that, Macaulay,' Lady Holland would say, tapping her 
fan upon the table. 'Now tell us about something 
else.' 



CHAPTER XIV. 

JOURNALS AND JOURNALISTS. 

There was no illustrated paper in 18o7 : there was no 
Punch. On the other hand, there were as many London 
papers as there are to-day, and nearly as many magazines 
and reviews. The Times ^ which is reported to have 
then had a circulation not exceeding 10,000 a day, was 
already the leading paper. It defended Queen Caroline, 
and advocated the Eeform Bill, and was reported to be 
ready to incur any expense for early news. Thus, in 
1834, on the occasion of a great dinner given to Lord 
Durham, the Times spent 200Z. in having an early 
report, and that up from the North by special mes- 
senger. This is not much in comparison with the 
enterprise of telegraph and special correspondents, but 
it was a great step in advance of other journals. The 
other morning papers were the Morning Herald^ the 
Morning Chronicle, the Morning Post, of which Cole- 
ridge was once on the staff, the Morning Aduertiser, 
which already represented the interest of which it is 
still the organ, and the old Public Ledger, for which 
Goldsmith had once written. 



2IO • FIFTY YEARS AGO 

The evening papers were the Globe, which had 
absorbed six other evening papers ; the Courier ; the 
Standard, once edited by Dr. Maginn ; and the True Sun. 

The weekhes were tlie Examiner, edited by the two 
Hunts and Albany Fonblanque ; the Spectator^ whose 
price seems to have varied from ninepence to a shilHng ; 
the Atlas ; Observer ; BeWs Life ; BeWs Weekly Messenger ; 
John Bull, which Theodore Hook edited ; the New WeeJcly 
Messenger ; the Sunday Times ; the Age ; the Satirist ; the 
Mark Lane Express ; the County Chroiiide ; the Weekly 
Dispatch, sometimes sold for 8JdI., sometimes for Qd. ; 
the Patriot ; the Christian Advocate ; the Watchman ; the 
Court Journal ; the Naval and Military Gazette ; and the 
United Service Gazette. 

Among the reporters who sat in the Gallery, it is 
remarkable that two-thirds did not write shorthand ; 
they made notes, and trusted to their memories ; Charles 
Dickens sat with them in the year 1836. 

The two great Quarterlies still continue to exist, but 
their power has almost gone ; nobody cares any more 
what is said by either, yet they are as well written as 
ever, and their papers are as interesting, if they are 
not so forcible. The Edinburgh Review is said to have 
had a circulation of 20,000 copies; the Quarterly is said 
never to have reached anything like that number. 
Among those who wrote for the latter fifty years ago, or 
thereabout, were Southey, Basil Hall, John Wilson 
Croker, Sir Francis Head, Dean Milman, Justice Cole 
ridge, Henry Taylor, and Abraham Hayward. The West- 




'S.<^^^W^r=^^C) 



JO URNA LS AND JO URN A LISTS 2 1 1 

minster, which also included the London, was supported 
by such contributors as the two Mills, father and son, 
Southwood Smith, and Roebuck. There was also the 
Foreign Quarterly, for which Scott, Southey, and Carlyle 
wrote. 

The monthlies comprised the Gentleman s [^\a\\ living), 
the Monthly Review ; the Monthly Magazine ; the Eclectic ; 
the New Monthly ; Fraser ; the Metropolitan ; the 
Monthly Repository ; the Lady's ; the Court ; the Asiatic 
Journal ; the East Lndia Revieiv ; and the United Ser- 
vice Journal. 

The weekly magazines were the Literary Gazette ; 
the Parthenon — absorbed in the Literary in 1842 ; the 
Athenceum, which Mr. Dilke bought of Buckingham, 
reducing the price from 8c?. to 4c?. ; the Mirror ; Cham- 
bers's Journal ; the Penny Magazine ; and the Saturday 
Magazine, a religious journal with a circulation of 
200,000. 

All these papers, journals, quarterlies, monthlies, 
and weeklies found occupation for a great number of 
journalists. Among those who wrote for the magazines 
were many whom we know, and some whom we have 
forgotten. Mr. Cornish, editor of the Monthly Maga- 
zine, seems forgotten. But he wrote ' Songs of the 
Loire,' the ' Gentleman's Book,' ' My Daughter's Book,' 
the 'Book for the Million,' and a 'Volume of the 
Affections.' Mr. Peter Gaskill, another forgotten worthy, 
wrote, besides his contributions to the monthly press, 
three laudable works, called ' Old Maids,' ' Old Bache- 



212 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

lors,' and ' Plebeians and Patricians.' John Gait, James 
and Horace Smith, Allan Cunningham, Sir Egertou 
Brydges, Sheridan Knowles, Eobert Hall, John Foster, 
James Montgomery, S. C. Hall, Grattan — author of 
' Highways and Byways ' — Marryat, John Mill, Peacock, 
Miss Martineau, Ebenezer Elliott, and Warren — author 
of ' A Diary of a Late Physician ' — all very respectable 
writers, sustained this mass of magazine literature. 

It will be seen, then, that London was as well sup 
plied with papers and reviews as it is at present — con- 
sidering the difference in population, it was much better 
supplied. Outside London, however, the demand for 
a daily paper was hardly known. There were in the 
whole of Great Britain only fourteen daily papers ; and 
in Ireland two. There are now 171 daily papers in 
Great Britain and fifteen in Ireland In country places, 
the weekly newspaper, pubhshed on Saturday night and 
distributed on Sunday morning, provided all the news 
that was required, the local intelligence being by far the 
most important. 

As to the changes which have come over the papers, 
the leading article, whose influence and weight seems to 
have culminated at the time of the Crimean War, was 
then of httle more value than it is at present. The 
news — there were as yet, happily, no telegrams — was 
still by despatches and advice ; and the latest news of 
markets was that brought by the last ship. We will 
not waste time in pointing out that Edinburgh was 
practically as far off as Gibraltar, or as anything else 



JOURNALS AND JOURNALISTS 213 

you please. But consider, if you can, your morning 
paper without its telegrams ; could one exist without 
knowing exactly all that is going on all over the world 
at the very moment ? We used to exist, as a matter of 
fact, very well indeed without that knowledge ; when 
we had it not we were less curious, if less well in- 
formed : there was always a pleasing element of un- 
certainty as to what might arrive : everything had to 
be taken on trust ; and in trade the most glorious for- 
tunes could be made and lost by the beautiful uncer- 
tainties of the market. Now we watch the tape, day 
by day, and hour by hour : we anticipate our views : 
we can only speculate on small differences : the biggest 
events are felt, long beforehand, to be coming. It is 
not an unmixed gain for the affairs of the whole world 
to be carried on under the fierce light of electricity, so 
that everybody may behold whatever happens day after 
day, as if one were seated on Olympus among the Im- 
mortal Gods. 



214 FIFTY YEARS AGO 



CHAPTER XY. 

THE SPORTSMAN. 

There were many various forms of sport open to the 
Englishman fifty years ago which are now wholly, or 
partly, closed. For instance, there was the P. E., then 
flourishing in great vigour — they are at this moment 
trying to revive it. A prize-fight was accompanied by 
every kind of blackguardism and villainy; not the least 
was the fact that the fights, towards the end of the 
record, were almost always conducted on the cross, so 
that honest betting men never knew where to lay their 
money. At the same time, the decay of boxing during 
the last twenty-five years has been certainly followed by 
a great decay of the national pluck and pugnacity, and 
therefore, naturally, by a decay of national enter- 
prise. We may fairly congratulate ourselves, therefore, 
that the noble art of self-defence is reviving, and 
promises to become as great and favourite a sport as 
before. Let all our boys be taught to fight. Fifty years 
ago there was not a day in a public school when there 
was not a fight between two of the boys ; there was 
not a day when there was not a street fight ; did not 



THE SPORTSMAN 215 

the mail-coach drivers who accompanied Mr. Samuel 
Weller on a memorable occasion leave behind them one 
of their number to fight a street porter in Fleet Street ? 
There was never a day when some young fellow did not 
take off his coat and handle his fives for a quarter of 
an hour with a drayman, a driver, a worldng man. It 
was a disgrace not to be able to fight. Let all our boys 
be taught again and encouraged to fight. Only the 
other day I read that there are no fights at Eton any 
more because the boys ' funk each other.' Eton boys 
funk each other ! But we need not believe it. Let there 
be no nonsense listened to about brutahty. The world 
belongs to the men who can fight. 

There were, besides the street fights, which kept 
things lively and gave animation to the dullest parts of 
the town, many other things which we see no longer. 
The bear who danced : the bull who was baited : the 
pigeons which were shot in Battersea Fields : the badger 
which was drawn : the dogs which were fought : the 
rats which were killed : the cocks which were fought : 
the cats which were thrown into the ponds : the ducks 
which were hunted — these amusements exist no longer; 
fifty years ago they afforded sport for many. 

Hunting, coursing, horse-racing, shooting, went on 
bravely. As regards game preserves, the laws were more 
rigidly enforced, and there was a much more bitter 
feeling towards them on the part of farmers then than 
now. On the other hand, there were no such wholesale 
battues ; sport involved uncertainty ; gentlemen did not 



2i6 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

sell their game ; rabbits, instead of being sent off to 
the nearest poulterer, were given to the labourers as 
they should be. 

The sporting instincts of the Londoner gave the 
comic person an endless theme for fun. He was always 
hiring a horse and coming to grief; he was perpetually 
tumbling off, losing his stirrups, letting his whip fall, 
having his hat blown off and carried away, and generally 
disgracing himself in the eyes of those with whom he 
wished to appear to the best advantage. There was 
the Epping Hunt on Easter Monday, where the sporting 
Londoners turned out in thousands ; there were the 
ponies on hire at any open place all round London — at 
Clapham Common, Blackheath, Hampstead, Epping. To 
ride was the young Londoner's greatest ambition : even 
to this day there is not one young man»in ten who will 
own without a blush that he cannot ride. To ride in 
the Park was impossible for him, because he had to be at 
his desk at ten ; a man who rides in the Park is inde 
pendent of the City ; but there were occasions on which 
everyone would long to be able to sit in the saddle. 

Eowing, athletics, and, above all, the cycle, have 
done much to counterbalance the attractions of the 
saddle. 

It seems certain, unless the comic papers all lie, that 
fifty years ago every young man also wanted to go 
shooting. Pemember how Mr. Winkle — an arrant 
Cockney, though represented as coming from Bristol — 
not only pretended to love the sport, but always went 



THE SPORTSMAN 217 

about attired as one ready to take the field. The 
Londoner went out into the fields, which then lay within 
liis reach all round the City, popping at everything. 
Let us illustrate the subject with the following descrip- 
tion of a First of September taken from the 'Comic 
Almanack ' of 1837. Perhaps Thackeray wrote it : — 

' Up at six. — Told Mrs. D. I'd got wery pressing business at 
Woolwich, and off to Old Fish Street, where a werry sporting 
breakfast, consisting of jugged hare, partridge pie, tally-ho sauce, 
gunpowder tea, and-csetera, vos laid out in Figgins's warehouse ; as 
he didn't choose Mrs. F. and his young hinfant family to know he 
vos a-goin to hexpose himself vith fire-harms. — After a good blow- 
out, sallied forth vith our dogs and guns, namely Mrs. Wiggins's 
French poodle, Miss Selina Higgins's real Blenheim spaniel, young 
Hicks's ditto, Mrs. Figgins's pet bull-dog, and my little thorough- 
bred tarrier ; all vich had been smuggled to Figgins's warehouse 
the night before, to perwent domestic disagreeables. — Got into a 
Paddington bus at the Bank. — Row with Tiger, who hobjected to 
take the dogs, unless paid hextra. — Hicks said we'd a rights to take 
'em, and quoted the hact. — Tiger said the hact only allowed parcels 
carried on the lap.^- Accordingly tied up the dogs in our pocket- 
handkerchiefs, and carried them and the guns on our knees.— Got 
down at Paddington ; and, after glasses round, valked on till ve got 
into the fields, to a place vich Higgins had baited vith corn and 
penny rolls every day for a month past. Found a covey of birds 
feeding. Dogs wery eager, and barked beautiful. Birds got up 
and turned out to be pigeons. Debate as to vether pigeons vos 
game or not. Hicks said they vos made game on by the new hact. 
Fired accordingly, and half killed two or three, vich half fell to the 
ground ; but suddenly got up again and flew off. Reloaded, and 
pigeons came round again. Let fly a second time, and tumbled two 
or three more over, but didn't bag any. Tired at last, and turned 
in to the Dog and Partridge, to get a snack. Landlord laughed, 
and asked how ve vos hoff for tumblers. Didn't understand him, 
but got some waluable hinformation about loading our guns ; vich 
he strongly recommended mixing the powder and shot well up 
together before putting into the barrel ; and showed Figgins how to 



2i8 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

cliarge his percussion ; vich being Figgins's first attempt under the 
new system, he had made the mistake of putting a charge of copper 
caps into the barrel instead of sticking von of 'em atop of the touch- 
hole. — Left the Dog and Partridge^ and took a nortli-easterly 
direction, so as to have the adwantage of the vind on our backs. 
Dogs getting wery riotous, and refusing to answer to Figgins's vhistle, 
vich had unfortunately got a pea in it. — Getting over an edge into 
a field, Hicks's gun haccidently hexploded, and shot Wiggins behind; 
and my gun going off hunexpectedly at the same moment, singed 
avay von of my viskers and blinded von of my heyes. — Carried 
Wiggins back to the inn : dressed his wound, and rubbed my heye 
mth cherry brandy and my visker with bear's grease. — Sent poor 
W. home by a short stage, and resumed our sport. — Heard some 
pheasants crowing by the side of a plantation. Resolved to stop 
their cockadoodledooing, so set off at a jog-trot. Passing thro' a 
field of bone manure, the dogs unfortunately set to work upon the 
bones, and we couldn't get 'em to go a step further at no price. 
Got vithin gun-shot of two of the birds, vich Higgins said they vos 
two game cocks : but Hicks, who had often been to Yestminster 
Pit, said no sitch thing ; as game cocks had got short square taDs, 
and smooth necks, and long military spurs ; and these had got long 
curly tails, and necks all over hair, and scarce any spurs at all. 
Shot at 'em as pheasants, and believe we killed 'em both ; but, 
hearing some orrid screams come out of the plantation immediately 
hafter, ve all took to our 'eels and ran avay vithout stopping to 
pick either of 'em up. — After running about two miles, Hicks called 
out to stop, as he had hobserved a covey of wild ducks feeding on a 
pond by the road side. Got behind a haystack and shot at the 
ducks, vich svam avay hunder the trees. Figgins wolunteered to 
scramble down the bank, and hook out the dead uns vith the but- 
hend of his gun. Unfortunately bank failed, and poor F. tumbled 
up to his neck in the pit. Made a rope of our pocket-handkerchiefs, 
got it round his neck, and dragged him to the Dog and Doublet, 
vere ve had him put to bed, and dried. Werry sleepy with the hair 
and hexercise, so after dinner took a nap a-piece. — Woke by the 
landlord coming in to know if ve vos the gentlemen as had shot the 
hunfortunate nursemaid and child in Mr. Smithville's plantation. 
Swore ve knew nothing about it, and vile the landlord was gone to 
deliver our message, got out of the back vindow, and ran avay 
across the fields. At the end of a mile, came suddenly upon a 



THE SPORTSMAN 219 

strange sort of bii'd, vich Hicks declared to be the cock-of-the- woods. 
Sneaked beliind him and killed him. Turned out to be a peacock. 
Took to our heels again, as ve saw the lord of the manor and two of 
his servants vitli bludgeons coming down the gravel valk towards us. 
Found it getting late, so agreed to shoot our vay home. Didn't 
know vere ve vos, but kept going on. — At last got to a sort of 
plantation, vere ve saw a great many birds perching about. Gave 
'em a broadside, and brought down several. Loaded again, and 
killed another brace. Thought ve should make a good day's vork 
of it at last, and vas preparing to charge again, ven two of the new 
police came and took us up in the name of the Zolorogical Society, 
in whose gardens it seems ve had been shooting. Handed off to the 
Public Hoffice, and werry heavily fined, and werry sewerely repri- 
manded by the sitting magistrate. — Coming away, met by the land- 
lord of the Dog and Doublet, who charged us with running off 
without paying our shot ; and Mr. Smithville, who accused us of 
manslaughtering his nurse-maid and child ; and, their wounds not 
having been declared immortal, ve vos sent to spend the night in 
prison — and thus ended my last First of September.' 

Those who wish to know what a Derby Day was 
fifty years ago may read the following contemporary 
narrative : — 

Here's a right and true list of all the running horses ! Dorling's 

correct card for the Derby day ! Hollo, old un ! hand us up one 

here, will you : and let it be a good un : there, now what's to pay ? 

Only sixpence. Sixpence ! I never gave more than a penny 

at Hook em Snivey in all my days. May be not, your honour : 

but Hookem Snivey aint Hepsom : and sixpence is what every 
gemman, as is a gemman, pays. 

I can buy 'em for less than that on the course, and I'll wait till 

I get there. Beg your honour's pardon They sells 'em a shillin' 

on the course. Give you threepence. They cost me tippence ha'p'ny 
farden. 

Well, here then, take your list back again. Come, come ; 

your honour shall have it at your own price : 1 wouldn't sell it 

nob'dy else for no sitch money : but I likes the sound of your wice. 

Here, then, give me the change, will you % — Oh, certainly : 

but your honour's honcommon ard : Let's see : you want two- 

'1\ 



220 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

and-threepence : wait a moment, there's another gentleman calling 
out for a card. 

Hollo, coachman, stop, stop ! Coachman, do you hear ? stop 

your horses this moment, and let me get down : The fellow's run 

away behind an omnibus without giving me change out of my half- 
crown. 

That's alvays the vay they does on these here hoccasions : they 

calls it catching a flat : Sorry I can't stop. Where's the new 

police % Pretty police truly, to suffer such work as that ! 

Well, if ever I come to Epsom again ! but let's look at the list: 

it's cost me precious dear ! Ascot, Mundig, Pelops ! why, good 

heavens, coachman ! they've sold me a list for last year ! 

' Oh, ma ! look there ! what a beautiful carriage ! scarlet and 

gold liveries, and horses with long tails. And stodge-full of 

gentlemen with mustaches, and cigars and macintoshes, and green 
veils : 

Whose is it, ma ? Don't know, my dear ; but no doubt belongs 

to some duke, or marquis, or other great nob.- Beg your pardon, 

ma'am : but that carriage as you're looking at is a party of the swell 
mob. 

And, oh my ! ma : look at that other, full of beautiful ladies, 

dressed like queens and princesses. Silks and satins and velvets, 

and gauze sleeves and ermine tippets : I never saw such elegant 
dresses : 

And how merry they look, laughing and smiling ! they seem de- 
termined to enjoy the sport : Who are they, ma % Don't know, 

dear ; but no doubt they're Court ladies. Yes, ma'am, Cranbourne 
Court. 

How do, Smith % nice sort of tit you've got there. Very nice 

indeed : very nice sort of mare. Beautiful legs she's got, and 

nicely-turned ancles, and 'pon my word, a most elegant head of hair. 

How old is she ? and how high does she stand ? I should like 

to buy her if she's for sale. Oh, she's quite young : not above 

live-and-twenty or thirty ; and her height exactly a yard and a half 
and a nail : 

Price eighty guineas. She'd be just the thing for you ; capital 

hunter as ever appeared at a fixture. Only part with her on 

account of her colour ; not that / mind : only Mrs. S. don't like an 
Oxford mixture. 

Hchlo ! you faylow ! you person smoking the pipe, I wish you'd 



THE SPORTSMAN 221 

take your quadruped out of the way. Quadruped, eh ? you be 

blowed ! it's no quadruped, but as good a donkey as ever was fed 
upon hay. 

Oh, my ! ma : there's the course. What lots of people, and 

horses, and booths, and grand stands ! And what oceans of gipsies 

and jugglers, and barrel organs, and military bands ! 

And was ever such sights of Savoyards and French women 

singing and E-0-tables ; And horses rode up and down by little 

boys, or tied together in bundles, and put up in calimanco stables ; 

And look at that one, they call him Boney --parte. Did you ever 

in all your lifetime see a leaner 1 And ' Royal Dinner Saloons ' 

(for royalty the knives might have been a little brighter, and tlie 
'inen a little cleaner); 

And women with last-dying speeches in one hand, and in the 

other all the best new comic songs ; And, dear me ! how funnily 

that gentleman sits his horse ; for all the world just like a pair of 
tongs. 

And — clear the course ! clear the course ! Oh, dear ! now the 

great Derby race is going to be run. Twelve to one ! Ten to 

one ! Six to one ! Nine to two ! Sixteen to three ! Done, done, 
done, done ! 

Here they come ! here they come ! blue, green, buff, yellow, 

black, brown, white, harlequin, and red ! Sir, I wish you'd 

stand off our carriage steps : it's quite impossible to see through your 
head. 

There, now they're gone : how many times round ? Times 

round, eh ? why, bless your innocent face ! It's all over. All 

over ! you don't say so ! I "wish I'd never come : such a take in ! 
call that a Derby race ! 

After being stifled with dust almost, and spoiling all our best 

bonnets and shawls and cloaks ! Call that a Derby race, indeed ! 

I'm sure it's no Derby, but nothing but a right-down, regular Oaks. 

But come, let's have a bit of lunch ; I'm as hungry as if I 

hadn't had a bit all day. Smith, what are you staring at ? why 

don't you make haste, and hand us the hamper this way ? 

We shall never have anything to eat all day if you don't stir 

yourself, and not go on at that horrid slow rate. Oh, Lord ! the 

bottom's out, and every bit of meat and drink, and worse than all, 
the knives and forks and plate, — 

Stole and gone clean away ! Good heavenlies ! and I told you 
21* 



2 22 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

to keep your eye on the basket, you stupid lout ! Well, so I 

did, on the top of it, but who'd have thought of their taking the 
bottom out % 

Well, never mind : they'll be prettily disappointed : for you 

know, betwixt you and me and the wall, Our ivory knives and 

forks were nothing but bone ; and our plate nothing but German 
silver, after all. 

What race is to be run next? No more, ma'am : the others 

were all run afore you come. Well, then, have the horses put 

to. Smith : I'll never come a Derbying again ; and let us be off 
Lome. 

Oh, lawk ! what a stodge of carriages ! I'm sure we shall never 

get off the course alive ! Oh, dear ! do knock that young drunken 

eentleman off the box : I'm sure he's not in a fit state to drive. 

There, I told you how it would be. Oh, law ! you've broke my 

arm, and compound-fractured my leg ! Oh ! for 'eaven's sake, 

lift them two 'orrid osses off my darter ! Sir, take your hands out 
of my pocket-hole, I beg ! 

I say, the next time you crawl out of a coach window, I wish 

you wouldn't put your foot on a lady's chest. Veil, if ever I seed 

such a purl as that (and I've seed many a good un in my time). 111 
be blest. 

Oh, dear ! going home's worse than coming ! It's ten to one if 
ever we get back to Tooley Street alive. — Such jostling, and pushing, 
and prancing of horses ! and always the tipsiest gentleman of every 
party will drive. 

I wish I was one of those ladies at the windows ; or even one 

of the servant maids giggling behind the garden walls. And oh ! 

there's Kennington turnpike ! what shouting and hooting, and 
blowing those horrid cat-calls ! 

Ticket, sir % got a ticket ? No, I've lost it. A shilling, then. 

A sliilling ! I've paid you once to-day. Oh, yes, I suppose 

so : the old tale ; but it won't do. That's what all you sporting 
gentlemen say. 

Hinsolent feller ! I'll have you up before your betters. Come, 
sir, you mustn't stop up the way. Well, I'll pay you again ; but, 
oh Lord 1 somebody's stole my purse ! good gracious, what shall I 

do ! 1 suppose I must leave my watch, and call for it to-morrow. 

Oh, ruination ! blow'd if that isn't gone too ! 

Get on there, will you ? — Well, stop a moment. Will anybody 



THE SPORTSMAN 223 

lend me a shilling ? No % Well, here then, take my hat : But if 

I don't show you up in Bell's Life in London, next Sunday morning, 
my name's not Timothy Flat. 

Well, this is my last journey to Epsom, my last appearance on 

any course as a backer or hedger : For I see plain enough a 

betting-book aint a day-book, and a Derby's a very different thing 
from a Ledger. 



2 24 FIFTY YEARS AGO 



CHAPTER XVI 

IN FACTOKY AND MINE. 

I DO not know any story, not even that of the slave- 
trade, which can compare, for brutahty and callousness 
of heart, with the story of the women and children 
employed in the factories and the mines of this realm. 
There is nothing in the whole history of mankind which 
shows more clearly the enormities which become possible 
when men, spurred by desire for gam, are left uncon- 
trolled by laws or the weight of public opinion, and 
placed in the position of absolute mastery over their 
fellow-men. The record of the slavery time is black in 
the West Indies and the United States, God knows ; but 
the record of the English mine and factory is blacker 
still. It is so black that it seems incredible to us. We 
ask ourselves in amazement if, fifty years ago, these 
things could be. Alas ! my fiiends, there are cruelties 
as great still going on around us in every great city, 
and wherever women are forced to work for bread. 
For the women and the children are inarticulate, and 
in the dark places, where no light of publicity pene- 
trates, the hand of the master is ^rmed with a scourge 



IN FACTORY AND MINE 



:25 





LETTING CHFLDEEN DOWN 
A CO.Ui MINE 

(From a Plate in tbe West- 
minster Review) 



of scorpions. Let us therefore humble ourselves, and 
read the story of the children in the mines with shame 
as well as with indignation. The cry of the needle- 
women is louder in our ears than the cry of the chil- 
dren in the mines 
ever was to our 
fathers ; j^et we 
regard it not. 

Fellow - sinners 
and partakers in 
the crimes of 
slavery, torture, 
and robbery of 
light, life, youth, 
and joy, hear tlie tale of the Factory 
and the Mine. 

Early in the century — in the 
year 1801 — the overcrowding of 
the factories and mills, the neglect 
of the simplest sanitary precautions, 
the long hours, the poor food, and 
insufficient rest, caused the outbreak of a dreadful 
epidemic fever, which alarmed even the mill-owners, 
because if they lost their hands they lost their ma- 
chinery. The hands are the producers, and tlie aim 
of the masters was to regard the producers as so many 
machines. Now if your machine is laid low with fever 
it is as good as an engine out of repair. 

For the first time in history, not only was the public 



226 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

conscience awakened, but the House of Commons was 
called upon to act in tlie interests of health, public 
morals, humanity, and justice. Strange, that the world 
had been Christian for so long, yet no law had been 
passed to protect women and children. In the Year of 
Grace 1802 a beginning was made. 

By the Act then passed the daily hours of labour 
for children were to be not more than twelve — yet 
think of making young children work for twelve hours 
a day ! — exclusive of an hour and a half for meals and 
rest, so that the working day really covered thirteen 
hours and a half, say from six in the morning until 
half-past seven in the evening. This seems a good day's 
work to exact of children, but it was a little heaven 
compared with the state of things which preceded the 
Act. Next, no children were to be employed under 
the age of nine. Certain factories, proved to be un- 
wholesome for children, were closed to them altogether. 
Twenty years later Sir John Cam Hobhouse — may his 
soul find peace ! — invented the Saturday half-hohday 
for factories. There was found, however, a loophole 
for cruelty and overwork ; the limitation of hours was 
evaded by making the hands work in relays, by which 
means a cliild might be kept at work half the night. 
It was, therefore, in 1833 enacted that there should be 
no work done at all between 8.30 p.m. and 5.30 a.m.: 
that children under thirteen should not work more than 
forty-eight hours a week, and those under eighteen 
should not work more than sixty- eight hours a week. 




,y C' c^ <^^l 



IN FACTORY AND MINE 227 

Observe that nothing — not the light of pubhcity, 
not public opinion, not common humanity, not pity 
towards the tender children — nothing but Law had any 
power to stop this daily massacre of the innocents. 
Yet, no doubt, the manufacturers were subscribing for 
all kinds of good objects, and reviling the Yankees con- 
tinually for the institution of Slavery. 

What happened next ? Greed of gain, seeing the 
factory closed, looked round, and saw wide open — not 
the gates of Hell — but the mouth of the Pit, and they 
flung the children down into the darkness, and made 
them work among the narrow passages and galleries of 
the coal mines. 

They took the child^ — boy or girl — at six years of 
age ; they carried the little thing away from the light 
of heaven, and lowered it deep down into the black and 
gloomy pit ; they placed it behind a door, and ordered 
it to pull this open to let the corves, or trucks, come 
and go, and to keep it shut when they were not passing. 
The child was set at the door in the dark — at first they 
gave it a candle, which would burn for an hour or two 
and then go out. Think of taking a child of six — your 
child, Madam ! — and putting it all alone down the dark 
mine ! They kept the little creature there for twelve 
interminable hours. If the child cried, or went to sleep, 
or neglected to pull the door open, they beat that child. 
The work began at four in the morning, and it was not 
brought out of the pit until four, or perhaps later, in the 
evening, so that in the winter the children never saw 



228 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

daj'light at all. The evidence given before the Eoyal 
Commission showed that the children, when they were 
bi-ought up to the pit's mouth, were heavy and stupefied, 
and cared for little when they had taken their supper 
but to go to bed. And yet the men who owned these 
colheries had children of their own ! And they would 
have gone on to this very day starving the children of 
hght and loading them with work, stunting their 
growth, and suffering them to grow up in ignorance 
all their days, but for Lord Shaftesbury. This is what 
is written of the children and their work by one who 
visited the mines; — 

To ascertain the nature of the employment of these children, I 
went down a pit. . . . Descending a shaft, 600 feet deep, T went 
some distance along a subterranean road which, I was told, was 
tliree miles in length. To the right and left of one of these roads 
or ways are low galleries, called workings, in which the hewers are 
employed, in a state of almost perfect nudity, on account of the 
great heat, digging out the coal. To these galleries there are traps, 
or doors, which are kept shut, to guard against the ingress or egress 
of inflammable air, and to prevent counter-currents disturbing the 
ventilation. The use of a child, six years of age, is to open and 
shut one of these doors when the loaded corves, or coal trucks, pass 
and repass. For this object the child is trained to sit by itself in a 
dark gallery for the number of hours I have described. The older 
boys drive horses and load the corves, but the little children are 
always trap-keepers. When first taken down they have a candle 
given them, but, gradually getting accustomed to the gloom of the 
place, they have to do without, and sit therefore literally in the dark 
the whole time of their imprisonment. 

When a child grew strong enough, he or she — 
boy or girl — was promoted to the post of drawer, or 
thrutcher. The drawer, boy or girl aUke, clad in a 



IN FACTORY AND MINE 



22q 



short pair of trousers and nothing else, had a belt tied 
round the waist and a chain attached by one end to 
the belt and the other to the corve, or truck, which 
he dragged along the galleries to the place where it 
was loaded for the mouth, the cliain passing between 
his legs ; on account of the low height of the galleries 
he had generally to go on all-fours. Those who were 
the thrutchers pushed the truck along with their heads 
and hands. They wore a thick cap, but the work 








/ W' 



i Hjskii* 



CHILDREN WORKING tH A COAL MINE 
(From a PLite iu tlie Westminstei' Review) 



made them bald on the top of the head. When the 
boys grew up they became hewers, but the women, if 
they stayed in the pit, remained drawers or thrutchers, 
continuing to the end of the day to push or drag the 
truck dressed in nothing but the pair of short trousers. 
This was a beautiful kind of life for Christian women 
and children to be leading. So many children were 
wanted, tliat in one colliery employing 400 hands there 
were TOO under twenty and 56 under thirteen. In 
another, where there was an inundation, there were 44 



230 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

children, of whom 26 were drowned ; of these 11 were 
girls and 15 boys ; 9 were under ten years of age. 
Again, in the year 1838, there were 38 children under 
thirteen killed by colliery accidents and 62 young people 
under eighteen. 

Wlien men talk about the interference of the State 
and the regulation of hours, let us always remember this 
history of the children in the Pit. Yet there were men 
in plenty who denounced the action of the Government : 
some of them were leaders in the philanthropic world ; 
some of them were religious men ; some of them humane 
men ; but they could not bear to think that any limit 
should be imposed upon the power of the employer. 
In point of fact, when one considers the use which the 
employer has always made of his power, how every 
consideration has been always set aside which might 
interfere with the acquisition of wealth, it seems as if 
the chief business of the Legislature should be the 
protection of the employed. 

Again, take the story of the chimney-sweep. Fifty 
years ago the master went his morning rounds accom- 
panied by his climbing boys. It is difficult now to 
understand how much time and trouble it took to 
convince people that the climbing boy was made to 
endure an extraordinary amount of suffering quite 
needlessly, because a brush would do the work quite 
as well. Consider : the poor httle wretch's hands, 
elbows, and knees were constantly being torn by the 
bricks; sometimes he stuck going up, sometimes 



IN FACTORY AND MINE 



231 



coming down ; sometimes the chimney-pot at the top 
fell off, the child with it, so that he was killed. He 
was beaten and kicked nnmercifuUy ; his master would 
sometimes light a fire underneath so as to force him to 




5i 

LONDON STBEET CHAEACTERS, 1837 

(From a Drawing by John Leech) 

come down quickly. The boy's life was intolerable to 

him. He was badly fed, badly clothed, and never 

washed, though his occupation demanded incessant 

cleanliness — the neglect of which was certain to bring 

on a most dreadful disease. And all this because his 
22 



232 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

master would not use a broom. It was not until 1841 
that the children were protected by Acts of Parliament. 
The men have shown themselves able to protect 
themselves. The improvement in their position is due 
wholly to their own combination. That it will still more 
improve no one can for a moment doubt. If we were 
asked to forecast the future, one thing would be safe to 
prophesy — namely, that it will become, day by day, 
increasingly difficult to get rich. Meanwhile, let us 
remember that we have with us still the women and 
the children, who cannot combine. We have 'protected 
the latter ; hoiv — oh I my brothers — how shall we protect 
the former? 



CHAPTEE XVn. 

WITH TQE MEN OF SCIENCE. 

On the science of fifty ^^ears ago, mucli might be written 
but for a single reason — namely, that I know very little 
indeed about the condition of science in that remote 
period, and very little about science of to-day. There 
were no telegraph wires, but there were semaphores 
talking to each other all day long ; there was no prac- 
tical application of electricity at all ; there was no tele- 
phone — I wish there were none now ; there were no 
an£esthetics ; there were no — but why go on ? Schools 
had no Science Masters ; universities no Science Tripos ; 
Professors of Science were a feeble folk. I can do no 
better for this chapter than to reproduce a report of a 
Scientific Meeting first published in Tilt's Annual, to 
which Hood, Thackeray, and other eminent professors 
of science contributed, for the year 1836 : — 

Extracts from the Proceedings of the Association of British 
Illuminati, at their Annual Meeting, held in Dublin, 
August, 1835. 

Dr. Hoaxum read an interesting paper on the conversion of 
moonbeams into substance, and rendering shadows permanent, both 
of which he had recently exemplified in the establishment of some 
public companies, whose prospectuses he laid upon the table. 



234 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

Mr. Babble produced his calculating machine, and its wonderful 
powers were tested in many ways by the r.udience. It supplied to 
Captain Sir John North an accurate computation of the distance 
between a quarto volume and a cheesemonger's shop ; and solved a 
curious question as to the decimal proportions of cunning and 
credulity, which, worked by the rule of allegation, would produce a 
product of 10,000^. 

Professor Von Hammer described his newly discovered process 
for breaking stones by an algebraic fraction. 

Mr. Crowsfoot read a paper on the natural history of the Rook. 
He defended their caws with great effect, and proved that there is 
not a grain of truth in the charges against them, which only arise 
from Grxih Street malice. 

The Rev. Mr. Groper exhibited the skin of a toad, which he dis- 
covered alive in a mass of sandstone. The animal was found engaged 
on its autobiography, and died of fright on having its house so 
suddenly broken into, being probably of a nervous habit from 
passing so much time alone. Some extracts from its memoir were 
read, and found exceedingly interesting. Its thoughts on the * silent 
system ' of prison discipline, though written in the dark, strictly 
agreed with those of our most enlightened political economists. 

Dr. Deady read a scientific paper on the manufacture of Hydro 
gin^ which greatly interested those of the association who were 
members of Temperance Societies. 

Mr. Croak laid on the table an essay from the Cabinet Makers' 
Society, on the construction oi frog-stools. 

Professor Parley exhibited his speaking machine, which distinctly 
articulated the words * Repale ! Resale 1 ' to the great delight of 
many of the audience. The learned Professor stated that he was 
engaged on another, for the use of his Majesty's Ministers, which 
would already say, * My Lords and Gentlemen ; ' and he doubted not, 
by the next meeting of Parliament, would be able to pronounce the 
whole of the opening speech. 

Mr. Multiply produced, and explained the principle of, his ex- 
aggerating machine. He displayed its amazing powers on the 
mathematical point, which, with little trouble, was made to appear 
as large as a coach- wheel. He demonstrated its utility in all the rela- 
tions of society, as applied to the failings of the absent — the growth 
of a tale of scandal — the exploits of travellers, &c. &c. 

The Author of the ' Pleasures of Hope ' presented, througli a 



WITH THE MEN OF SCIENCE 235 

member, a very amusing Essay on the gratification arising from the 
throttling of crying children ; but as the ladies would not leave the 
room, it could not be read. 

Captain North exhibited some shavings of the real Pole, and a 
small bottle which, he asserted, contained scintillations of the Aurora 
Borealis, from which, he stated, he had succeeded in extracting pure 
gold. He announced that his nephew was preparing for a course of 
similar experiments, of which he expected to know the result in 
October. The gallant Captain then favoured the company with a 
dissertation on phrenology, of which, he said, he had been a believer 
for thirty years. He stated that he had made many valuable 
verifications of that science on the skulls of the Esquimaux ; and 
that, in his recent tour in quest of subscribers to his book, his great 
success had been mainly attributable to his phrenological skill ; for 
that, whenever he had an opportunity of feeling for soft places in 
the heads of the public, he knew in a moment whether he should 
get a customer or not. He said that whether in the examination of 
ships' heads or sheep's heads — in the choice of horses or housemaids, 
he had found the science of pre-eminent utility. He related the 
following remarkable phrenological cases : — A man and woman 
were executed in Scotland for murder on presumptive evidence ; 
but another criminal confessed to the deed, and a reprieve arrived 
the day after the execution. The whole country was horrified ; but 
Captain North having examined their heads, he considered, from 
the extraordinary size of their destructive organs, that the sentence 
was prospectively just, for they must have become murderers, had 
tJiey escaped hanging then. Their infant child, of six months old, 
was brought to him, and, perceiving on its head the same fatal 
tendencies, he determined to avert the evil ; for which purpose, by 
means of a pair of moulds, he so compressed the skull in its 
vicious propensities, and enlarged it in its virtuous ones, that the 
child grew up a model of pei-fection. The second instance was of a 
married couple, whose lives were a continued scene of discord till 
they parted. On examining their heads scientifically, he discovered 
the elementary causes of their unhappiness. Their skulls were un- 
fortunately too thick to be treated as in the foregoing case ; but, 
causing both their heads to be shaved, he by dint of planing down 
in some places, and laying on padding in others, contrived to produce 
all the requisite phrenological developments, and they were then 
living, a perfect pattern of conjugal felicity, ' a thing which could 



236 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

not have liappened without phrenology.' (This dissertation was 
received with loud applauses from the entire assembly, whose phreno- 
logical organs becoming greatly excited, and developed in an 
amazing degree by the enthusiasm of the subject, they all fell to 
examining each other's bumps with such eagerness that the meeting 
dissolved in confusion.) 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

LAW AND JUSTICE. 

FiTK THOUSAND THRER HUNDEED AND FOUTY-FOUR enact- 
ments have been added to the Statute Book since the 
Queen came to the throne, and the figures throw a 
liood of Ught upon the ' progress ' of the Victorian era. 
In order to reahse where we were in 1837 we have 
only to obhterate this enormous mass of legislation 
In the realm of law there seems then to be little left. 
All our procedure — equitable, legal, and criminal — much 
of the substance of equity, law, and justice, as we un- 
derstand the words, is gone. 'Law' had a different 
meaning fifty years ago ; ' equity ' hardly had any mean- 
ing at all ; ' justice ' had an ugly sound. 

The ' local habitation' of the Courts, it is true, was 
then much the same as it remained for the next forty- 
five years. The network of gloomy little rooms, con- 
nected with narrow winding passages, which Sir John 
Soane built in 1820-1825, on the west side of West- 
minster Hall, on the site of the old Exchequer Cham- 
ber, with an exterior in imitation of Palladio's basilica 
at Vicenza, but outrageously out of keeping with the 



238 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

glorious vestibule of" William Rufus, was then tlie home 
of law. The Court of Chancery met in a gloomy little 
apartment near the southern end of the hall. Here the 
Lord Chancellor sat in term time — there were then 
four terms of three weeks each — with the mace and 
crimson silk bag, embroidered with gold, in which was 
deposited the silver pair of dies of the Great Seal, 
and a large nosegay of flowers before him. It was, 
in those days, only in the vacations that the Chancellor 
sat at Lincoln's Inn. The Master of the Eolls and the 
Vice-Chancellor of England also sat at Westminster 
during the sittings, while in the intervals the former 
presided over the Rolls Court in Eolls Yard and the 
latter over the Court which had been built for him on 
the west side of Lincoln's Inn Hall. The three Com- 
mon Law Courts, moreover, during term time, sat twelve 
days at Westminster and twelve days at the Guildhall, 
while the Assizes were chiefly held during the vacations. 
The High Court of Admiralty held its sittings at 
Doctors' Commons, in both the Instance Court and 
the Prize Court, practically throughout the legal year, 
and so did the Ecclesiastical Courts. The Bankruptcy 
Court was in BasinghaU Street ; the Insolvent Debtors' 
Court in Lincoln's Inn Fields, with an entrance from 
Portugal Street. There were then no County Courts. 
The ancient Hundred and County Courts, with their 
primitive procedure, had long been disused. Certain 
' Courts of Conscience ' or ' Courts of Request ' had, 
it is true, been established for particular localities at 



LA W AND JUSTICE 



239 



the express request of the inhabitants, and these were 
still being constituted in some of the large towns. Then 
in London there were local Courts with a pecuhar juris- 
diction, such as the City Courts, which would fill a 
chapter by themselves, and of which it is enough to 




MARSHALSEA — THE COURT YAKD 



name the Lord Mayor's Court, the Sheriff's Courts of 
Poultry Compter and Giltspur Street Compter, both 
afterwards merged into the City of London Court. Li 
Great Scotland Yard there was the Palace Court, with 
the Knight Marshal for judge, which anciently had 



240 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

exclusive jurisdiction in matters connected witli the 
Royal Household, but now was a minor court of 
record for actions for debt within Westminster and 
twelve miles round. The Court had its own prison in 
High Street, South wark — the Marsh alsea of ' Little 
Dorrit,' not the old historic Marshalsea, which was 
demolished at the beginning of the century — that stood 
farther north, occupying the site of No. 119 High Street — 
but a new Marshalsea, built in 1811 on the site of the 
old White Lyon, once a hostelry, but since the end of the 
sixteenth century itself a prison. The Palace Court 
came to a sudden end in 1849, owing to 'Jacob 
Omnium ' being sued in it. Thackeray tells the story 
in ' Jacob Homnium's Hoss : ' — 

Pore Jacob went to Court, 

A Counsel for to fix. 
And choose a barrister out of the four, 

And an attorney of the six. 
And there he sor these men of lor, 

And watched them at their tricks. 



a weary day was that 

For Jacob to go through ; 
The debt was two seventeen 

(Which he no mor owed than you), 
And then there was the plaintives costS;. 

Eleven pound six and two. 

And then there was his own, 
Which the lawyers they did fix 

At the wery moderit figgar 
Of ten pound one and six. 

Now Evins bless the Pallis Court, 
And all its bold ver-dicks ! 



LA IV AND JUSTICE 241 

The sittings of the Central Criminal Court, which 
was founded in 1834, were held, as they are still held, in 
the Sessions House in the Old Bailey. Rebuilt in 1809 
on the site of the old Sessions House which was de- 
stroyed in the No-Popery riots of 1780, and of the old 
Surgeons' Hall — where the bodies of the malefactors 
executed in Newgate were dissected — the building, 
although sufficiently commodious for holding the 
sessions of London and Middlesex, for which it was 
originally intended, as the centre of the criminal juris- 
diction of the kingdom, was never anything but a 
makeshift. Since, however, its dingy Courts have re- 
mained the same down to our own times, we can the 
better realise the surroundings of the criminal trials 
of those days. It was here that Greenacre was tried 
in 1837. Bow Street was then in the zenith of its fame, 
and was practically the centre of the police arrange- 
ments of London. 

Those were the palmy days of the Court of 
Chancery. Eeform was, as it had been for centuries, 
in the air, and there, notwithstanding the efforts of 
Lord Lyndhurst, it seemed likely to remain. Practically 
nothing had been done to carry into effect the recom- 
mendations of the Commission of 1826. At the time 
of her Majesty's accession there were nearly a thousand 
causes waiting to be heard by the Lord Chancellor, the 
Master of the Rolls, and the Vice-Chancellor of England. 
It was verily a ' dead sea of stagnant litigation.' ' The 
load of business now before the Court,' remarked Sir 



242 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

Lancelot Shadwell, 'is so great that three angels could 
not get through it.' Think what this meant ! Manj 
of these suits had endured for a quarter of a century, 
some for half a century ; ' the lawyers,' to use the 
current, if incorrect, phrase of the time, ' tossing the 
balls to each other.' One septuagenarian suitor, 
goaded to madness by the ' law's delay,' had, a few 
years before, thrust his way into the presence of Lord 
Eldon, and begged for a decision in a cause waiting for 
judgment which had been before the Court ever since 
the Lord Chancellor, then nearly eighty, was a 
schoolboy. Everyone remembers ' Miss Flite,' who 
expected a judgment — ' on the Day of Judgment,' and 
Gridley * the man from Shropshire : ' both are true 
types of the Chancery suitors of fifty, thirty, twenty 
years ago. It would be wearisome indeed to detail 
the stages through which a Chancery suit dragged its 
slow length along. The ' eternal ' bills, with which it 
began — and ended — cross bills, answers, interrogatories, 
replies, rejoinders, injunctions, decrees, references to 
masters, masters' reports, exceptions to masters' reports, 
were veritably ' a mountain of costly nonsense.' And 
when we remember that the intervals between the 
various stages were often measured by years — that every 
death made a bill of review, or, Avorse still, a supple- 
mental suit, necessary — we can realise the magnitude 
of the evil. The mere comparison of the ' bills ' in 
Chancery with the ' bills of mortality ' shows that with 
proper management a suit need never have come to an 



LA W AND JUSTICE 243 

end. There is a story for which the late Mr. Chitty 
is responsible, that an attorney on the marriage of his 
son handed him over a Chancery suit with some 
common law actions. A couple of years afterAvards 
the son asked his father for some more business. ' Why, 
I gave you that capital Chancery suit,' replied his 
father ; ' what more can you want ? ' ' Yes, sir,' said 
the son ; ' but I have wound up the Chancery suit and 
given my chent great satisfaction, and he is in possession 
of the estate.' ' What, you improvident fool ! ' rejoined 
the father indignantly. ' That suit was in my family 
for twenty-five years, and would have continued so for 
so much longer if I had kept it. I shall not encourage 
such a fellow.' 

As in Butler's time it might still be said : — 

So lawyers, lest the Bear defendant, 
And plaintiff Dog, should make an end ou't, 
Do stave and tail with writ of error, 
Reverse of judgment, and demurrer, 
To let them breathe awhile, and then 
Cry Whoop ! and set them on again. 

In fact, like ' Jarndyce and Jarndyce,' hundreds of 
suits struggled on until they expired of inanition, the 
costs having swallowed up the estate. Such were the 
inevitable delays fifty years ago, that no one could 
enter into a Chancery suit with the least prospect of 
being alive at its termination. It was no small part 
of the duty of the respectable members of the legal 
profession to keep their clients out of Chancery. It 



244 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

was, perhaps, inevitable that this grievance should have 
been made the shuttlecock of party, that personalities 
should have obscured it, that, instead of the system, the 
men who were almost as much its victims as the 
suitors should have been blamed. Many successive 
Lord Chancellors in this way came in for much unde- 
served obloquy. The plain truth was, they were over- 
worked. Besides their political functions, they had 
to preside in the Lords over appeals from themselves, 
the Master of the Eolls, and the Vice-Chancellor ; they 
had some heavy work in bankruptcy and lunacy. The 
number of days that could be devoted to sitting as a 
Chancery judge of first instance was, therefore, ne- 
cessarily small. That this was the keynote of the 
difficulty was shown by the marked improvement 
which followed upon the appointment of two additional 
Vice-Chancellor s in 1841. In that year, too, another 
scandal was done away with by the abolition of the 
Six Clerks' office — a characteristic part of the unwieldy 
machine. The depositaries of the practice of the Court, 
the Six Clerks and their underlings, the 'Clerks in 
Court,' were responsible for much of the delay which 
arose. The ' Six Clerks ' were paid by fees, and their 
places were worth nearly two thousand a year, for which 
they did practically nothing, all their duties being dis- 
charged by deputy. No one, it was said, ever saw one of 
the 'Six Clerks.' Even in their office they were not 
known. The Masters in Chancery were, too, in those days 
almost as important functionaries as the judges them- 



LA W AND JUSTICE 245 

selves. Judges' Chambers were not then in existence, 
and much of the work which now comes before the 
judges was disposed of by a master, as well as such 
business as the investigation of titles, the taking of 
accounts, and the purely administrative functions of the 
Court. All these duties they discharged with closed 
doors and free from any supervision worth talking 
about. They, too, were paid by fees, their receipts 
amounting to an immense sum, and it was to them that 
the expense of proceedings was largely due. The 
agitation for their abohtion, although not crowned 
with success until fifteen years later, was in full blast 
fifty years ago. 

At law, matters were little better. ' Justice was 
strangled in the nets of form.' The Courts of King's 
Bench, Common Pleas, and Exchequer were not only at 
conflict with Equity, but in a lesser degree with each 
other. The old fictions by which they ousted each 
other's jurisdiction lasted down to 1S31, when, by statute, 
a uniformity of process was established. It seems now- 
adays to savour of the Middle Ages, that in order to 
bring an action in the King's Bench it should have been 
necessary for the writ to describe the cause of action 
to be ' trespass,' and then to mention the real cause of 
action in an ac etiam clause. The reason for this absurd 
formality was that, ' trespass ' still being an offence of a 
criminal nature, the defendant was constructively in the 
custody of the Marshal of the Marshalsea, and therefore 
within the jurisdiction of the King's Bench. In the 
23 



246 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

same way a civil matter was brought before the Court 
of Exchequer by the pretence that the plaintiff was a 
debtor to the King, and was less able to pay by reason 
of the defendant's conduct. The statement, although in 
ninety-nine cases out of a hundred a mere fiction, was 
not allowed to be contradicted. But the fact that the 
jurisdiction of the Court of Common Pleas was thus 
entrenched upon was less serious than it might have 
been, since in that court the Serjeants still had exclusive 
audience ; and, distinguished as were the members of 
the Order of the Coif, it is easy to understand that the 
pubhc preferred to have their pick of the Bar. 

But a much more serious matter was the block in 
the Courts. This perennial grievance seems to have 
then been chiefly due to the shortness of the terms 
during which alone legal questions could be decided. 
Niai prius trials only could be disposed of in the vaca- 
tions. Points of law or practice, however, cropped up 
in those days in even the simplest matter, and, since 
these often had to stand over from term to term, the 
luckless litigants were fortunate indeed if they had not 
to wait for years before the question in dispute was 
finally disposed of. The Common Law Procedure, 
moreover, literally bristled with technicalities. It was 
a system of solemn juggling. The real and imaginary 
causes of action were so mixed up together, the ' plead- 
ings ' required such a mass of senseless falsehood, that 
it is yjerfectly impossible that the parties to the action 
could have the least apprehension of what they were 



LA IF AND JUSTICE 2^,1 

doing. Then no two different causes of action could be 
joined, but each had to be prosecuted separately through 
all its stages. None of the parties interested were compe- 
tent to give evidence. It was not until 1851 that the 
plaintiff and the defendant, often the only persons who 
could give any account of the matter, could go into the 
witness-box. Mistakes in such a state of things were, 
of course, of common occurrence, and in those days 
mistakes were fatal. Proceedings by way of appeal 
were equally hazardous and often impracticable. The 
Exchequer Chamber could only take cognisance of 
' error ' raised by a ' bill of exceptions ; ' and even at 
this time the less that is said about that triumph of 
special pleading the better. The House of Lords could 
only sit as a Court of Error upon points which had run 
the gauntlet of the Exchequer Chamber. But perhaps 
the crowning grievance of all — a grievance felt equally 
keenly by suitors at law and in equity — arose from the 
limited powers of the Courts. If there were a remedy 
at law for any given wrong, for instance, the Court of 
Chancery could give no relief. In the same way, if it 
turned out, as it often did, that a plaintiff should have 
sued in equity instead of proceeding at law, he was 
promptly nonsuited. Law could not grant an injunc- 
tion ; equity could not construe an Act of Parliament. 

There were then, as we have said, no County Courts. 
The Courts of Eequests, of which there were not a hun- 
dred altogether, only had jurisdiction for the recovery 
of debts under 40^. We have already given an illustra- 



248 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

lion of the methods of Palace Court, which may serve 
as a type of these minor courts of record. Indeed, with 
the exception of the City of London, which was before 
the times in this respect, there was throughout the 
kingdom a denial of justice. Those who could not 
afford to pay the Westminster price had to go without. 
For in those days all matters intended to be heard at 
the Assizes were in form prepared for trial at West- 
minster. The ' record ' was delivered to the officers 
of the King's Bench, Common Pleas, or Exchequer, and 
the cause was set down for trial at Westminster, nisi 
prius in the meantime the judges happened to go on 
circuit into the county in which the cause of action 
arose, — in which event one of them would take down 
the record, try the action with a jury of the county, 
pronounce judgment according to the verdict, and 
bring back verdict and judgment, to be enrolled in 
due course at Westminster. In equity, things were 
even worse. There was, except in the counties palatine 
of Durham and Lancaster, no local equitable jurisdic- 
tion. And it was commonly said, and said with obvious 
truth, that no sum of less than 500/. was worth suing 
for or defending in the Court of Chancery. 

Divorce was then the ' luxury of the wealthy.' An 
action for the recovery of damages against the co-re- 
spondent, and a suit in the Ecclesiastical Courts for a 
separation ' from bed and board,' themselves both 
tedious and costly, after having been successfully pro- 
secuted, had to be followed by a Divorce Bill, which 



LA W AND JUSTICE 249 

had to pass throiigli all its stages in both Lords and 
Commons, before a divorce a vinculo matrimonii could 
be obtained. There is a hoary anecdote which usefully 
illustrates how this pressed upon the poor. ' Prisoner 
at the bar,' said a judge to a man who had just been 
convicted of bigamy, his wife having run away with 
another man, * the institutions of your country have 
provided you Avith a remedy. You should have sued 
the adulterer at the Assizes, and recovered a verdict 
against him, and then taken proceedings by your 
proctor in the Ecclesiastical Courts. After their suc- 
cessful termination you might have applied to Parlia- 
ment for a Divorce Act, and your counsel would have 
been heard at the Bar of the House.' ' But, my lord,' 
said the disconsolate bigamist, 'I cannot afford to 
bring actions or obtain Acts of Parliament ; I am only 
a very poor man.' 'Prisoner,' rejoined the judge, with 
a twinkle in his eye, ' it is the glory of the law of Eng- 
land that it knows no distinction between rich and 
poor.' Yet it was not until twenty years after the 
Queen came to the throne that the Court for Divorce 
and Matrimonial Causes was created. 

Probate, too, and all matters and suits relating to 
testacy and intestacy, were disposed of in the Ecclesias- 
tical Courts, — tribunals were attached to the arch- 
bishops, bishops, and archdeacons. The Court of 
Arches, the supreme Ecclesiastical Court for the Pro- 
vince of Canterbury, the Prerogative Court, where all 
contentious testamentary causes were tried, as well as 



250 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

the Admiralty Courts, were held at Doctors' Commons. 
It was a curious mixture of spiritual and legal func- 
tions. The judges and officers of the Court were often 
clergy without any knowledge of the law. They were 
paid by fees, and, according to the common practice of 
those days, often discharged their duties by deputy. 
The advocates who practised befoi^e them were, too, 
anything but 'learned in the law.' They wore in Court, 
if of Oxford, scarlet robes and hoods Uned with taffety, 
and if of Cambridge, white miniver and round black 
velvet caps. The proctors wore black robes and hoods 
Hned with fur. The procedure was similar to that in 
vogue in the Common Law Courts, but the nomencla- 
ture was entirely different. The substitute for punish- 
ment was ' penance,' and the consequence of non-sub- 
mission ' excommunication,' which, in addition to spiri- 
tual pains, incapacitated the delinquent from bringing 
any action, and at the end of forty days rendered him 
liable to imprisonment by the Court of Chancery. The 
practical result was that both penance and excommu- 
nication were indirect methods of extracting money 
payments. But the whole system was full of abuses, 
and when, twenty years later, these courts were shorn 
of all their important functions, it was with the uni- 
versal concurrence of the public. Until then there 
were many who shared the opinion of De Foe's intelli- 
gent foreigner, that ' England was a fine country, but 
a man called Doctors' Commons was the devil, for there 
was no getting out of his clutches, let one's cause be 



LA W AND JUSTICE 25 1 

never so good, without paying a great deal ol 
money.' 

In bankruptcy, a severity which was simply ferocious 
prevailed. Traders owing more than 300/., and a 
little later all traders, could obtain a discharge upon 
full disclosure and surrender of all their property ; but 
even then the proceedings were protracted to an almost 
interminable length. The machinery was both cum- 
brous and costly. Down to 1831 the bankruptcy law in 
London was administered by Commissioners appointed 
separately for each case by the Lord Chancellor. In 
that year a Court of Eeview was established, with a 
chief judge and two minor judges ; and this to some 
extent controlled and supervised the proceedings of 
the Commissioners, now a permanent body. In the 
country, however, the old procedure prevailed ; but the 
amount of business done was ridiculously small, creditors 
preferring, as they always probably will do, to write off 
the bad debts rather than to attempt to recover them 
by the aid of the bankruptcy law. The system, more- 
over, bristled with pains and penalties. If a bankrupt, 
as alleged, did not surrender to his commission within 
forty-two days of notice ; nor make discovery of his 
estate and effects ; nor deliver up his books and papers, 
he was to be deemed a felon and liable to be transported 
for life. An adjudication — the first stage in the pro- 
ceedings — was granted upon the mere affidavit of a 
creditor, a fiat was issued, the Commissioners held a 
meeting, and, without hearing the debtor at all, declared 



252 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

him a bankrupt. It was thus quite possible for a 
trader to find himself in the Gazette^ and ultimately in 
prison, although perfectly solvent. He had his remedies, 
it is true. He could bring an action of trespass or false 
imprisonment against the Commissioners. He could 
make things uncomfortable for the assignee, by im- 
peaching the validity of the adjudication. But in any 
case a delay extending perhaps over many years was 
inevitable before the matter was decided. 

' Insolvent debtors,' as those not in trade were dis- 
tinguished, were in yet worse case. Imprisonment on 
' mesne process ' or, in plain English, on the mere affi- 
davit of a creditor, was the leading principle of this 
branch of the bankruptcy law ; and in prison the debtor 
remained until he found security or paid. The anomaly 
which exempted real estate from the payment of debts 
had been removed in 1825 ; and, since then, a debtor, 
actually in prison, could obtain a release from confine- 
ment by a surrender of all his real and personal property, 
although he remained liable for all the unpaid portion 
of his debts whenever the Court should be satisfied of 
his ability to pay them . Everything, moreover, depended 
upon the creditor. He still had an absolute option, after 
verdict and judgment, of taking the body of the debtor 
in satisfaction, and the early records of the Court for 
the Belief of Insolvent Debtors show how weak and 
impotent were the remedies provided by the Legis- 
lature. It was not until twenty years later that the full 
benefits of bankruptcy were extended to persons who 



LA W AND J USTICE 253 

had become indebted without fraud or culpable negli- 
gence. Enough has already been said of tlie state of 
the debtors' prisons. It is sufficient to add here that in 
the second year of the Queen nearly four thousand per- 
sons were arrested for debt in London alone, and of these 
nearly four hundred remained permanently in prison. 

It was, however, in the administration of the criminal 
law that the harsh temper of the times reached its 
zenith. Both as regards procedure and penalties, justice 
then dealt hardly indeed with persons accused of crimes. 
In cases of felony, for instance, the prisoner could not, 
down to 1836, be defended by counsel, and had, there- 
fore, to speak for himself. Now think what this meant ! 
The whole proceedings, from arrest to judgment, were 
— for the matter of that they still are — highly artificial 
and technical. The prisoner, often poor and uneducated, 
was generally unaccustomed to sustained thought. The 
indictment, which was only read over to him, was often 
almost interminable in length, with a separate count for 
each offence, and all the counts mixed and varied in every 
way that a subtle ingenuity could suggest. Defences 
depended as largely for their success upon the prisoner 
taking advantage of some technical flaw (which, in many 
cases, had to be done before pleading to the indictment), 
as upon his establishing his innocence upon the facts. 
But what chance had an illiterate prisoner of detecting 
even a fundamental error when he was not allowed a 
copy of the document ? In fact, in the words of Mr. 
Justice Stephen, the most eminent living authority upon 



254 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

the history of our criminal law, ' it is scarcely a parody 
to say that from the earliest times down to our own 
days the law relating to indictments was much the 
same as if some small proportion of the prisoners con- 
victed had been allowed to toss-up for their liberty.' 

There might, further, be the grossest errors of law, 
as laid down by the judge to tlie jury, or of fact upon 
the evidence, without the prisoner having any remedy. 
Neither the evidence nor the judge's directions appeared 
upon the face of the ' record,' and it was only for some 
irregularity upon the record that a writ of error would 
lie. A curious practice, however, gradually sprang up, 
whereby substantial miscarriage of justice was often 
averted. If a legal point of any difficulty arose in any 
criminal case heard at the Assizes, or elsewhere, the 
judge respited the prisoner, or postponed judgment, and 
reported the matter to the judges. The point reserved 
was then argued before the judges by counsel, not 
in court, but at Serjeants' Inn, of which all the judges 
were members. If it was decided that the prisoner had 
been improperly convicted, he received a free pardon. 
It was this tribunal which was in 1848 erected into the 
Court for Crown Cases Eeserved. 

The outcry against capital punishment for minor 
felonies was still in full blast. The history of this 
legislation is extremely curious. The value of human 
hfe was slowly raised. It had, thanks to the noble 
efforts of Sir Samuel Romilly, ceased to be a capital 
offence to steal from a shop to the amount of 5s. ; 



LA W AND JUSTICE 255 

but public opinion was still more enlightened than 
the laws. A humane judge compelled to pass sentence 
of death upon a woman convicted of stealing from a 
dwelHng-house to the value of 405., shocked when the 
wretched victim fainted away, cried out, ' Good woman, 
good woman, I don't mean to hang you. I don't mean 
to hang you. Will nobody tell her I don't mean to 
hang her ? ' Jurors perjured themselves rather than 
subject anybody to this awful penalty. In 1833 Lord 
Suffield, in the House of Lords, declared, ' I hold 
in my hand a list of 555 perjured verdicts dehvered at 
the Old Bailey in fifteen years, for the single offence of 
stealing from dwelling-houses ; the value stolen being 
in these cases sworn above the value of 405. ; but the 
verdicts returned being to the value of 395. only.' 
Human life was, then, appraised at 5Z. But juries 
were equal to the occasion. Disregarding the actual 
amount stolen, they substituted for the old verdict 
* Guilty of stealing to the value of 395.' — ' Guilty of 
stealing to the value of 4/. 195.' Here is an illustration. 
A man was convicted at the Old Bailey of robbing his 
employers to the amount of 1,000/. The evidence was 
overwhelming. Property worth 200/. was found in his 
own room ; 300/. more was traced to the man to whom 
he had sold it. The jury found him guilty of stealing to the 
amount of 4/. 195. He was again indicted for stealing 
25/., and again convicted of stealing less than 5/. In 
the remaining indictments the prosecutors allowed him 
to plead guilty to the same extent. In tlie same way, 



256 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

for years prior to 1832, when the death penalty for 
forgery was abolished — except in the cases of wills and 
powers of attorney relating to the public funds — juries 
refused to convict. 'Prisoner at the bar,' said Chief 
Baron Eichards to a man acquitted at Carnarvon 
Assizes for forging Bank of England notes, ' although 
you have been acquitted by a jury of your country- 
men of the crime of forgery, I am as convinced of 
your guilt as that two and two make four.' And the 
jury privately admitted that they were of the same 
opinion. In short, the severity of the penal code was 
a positive danger to the community. Professed thieves 
made a rich harvest by getting themselves indicted capi- 
tally, because they then felt sure of escape. The sentence, 
moreover, could not be carried out. It became usual 
in all cases except murder to merely order it to be 
recorded, which had the effect of a reprieve. Here are 
some figures. In the three years ended December 
31, 1833, there were 896 commitments in London and 
Middlesex on capital offences and only twelve exe- 
cutions. In 1834, 1835, and 1836 there were 823 
commitments and no executions. With the first year 
of the Queen a more merciful regime w^as begun. Six 
offences — forgery in all cases ; rioting ; rescuing mur- 
derers ; inciting to mutiny ; smuggling with arms ; and 
kidnapping slaves — were declared not capital. But it 
was not until 1861 that all these blots were finally 
erased from the Statute Book. 

Among other mediasval barbarities, the dissection 



LA W AND JUSTICE 257 

of a murderer's body was not abolished until 1861, but 
it was made optional in 1832. Hanging in chains 
was done away with in 1834. The pillory, a punish- 
ment limited to perjury since 1816, was altogether 
abolished in 1837. The stocks had been generally su- 
perseded by the treadmill ten years earlier. Common 
assaults and many misdemeanours were, on the other 
hand, much more leniently dealt with in those days 
than they are in our own. As late as 1847 a case 
occurred in which a ruffian pounded his wife with his 
fists so that she remained insensible for three days. 
Yet, since he used no weapon, he could only be con- 
victed of a common assault and imprisoned without 
hard labour. 

But it was not perhaps an unmixed evil that the 
powers of the magistrates were then very Hmited. 
The ' Great Unpaid,' as they were then universally 
known, were a bye- word. Their proceedings, both at 
Petty and Quarter Sessions, were disgraced bj igno- 
rance, rashness, and class prejudice. Summary juris- 
diction was then, fortunately, only in its infancy. 



2sS FIFTY YEARS AGO 



CHAPTER XIX. 

CONCLUSION. 

The consideration of the country as it was would not 
be complete without some comparison with the country 
as it is. But I will make this comparison as brief as 
possible. 

In the Church, the old Calvinism is well-nigh dead : 
even the Low Church of the present day would have 
seemed, fifty years ago, a kind of veiled Popery. And 
the Church has grown greater and stronger. She will 
be greater and stronger still when she enlarges her 
borders to admit the great bodies of Nonconformists. 
The old grievances exist no longer; there are no 
pluralists : there is no non-resident Vicar : the small 
benefices are improved : Church architecture has re- 
vived : the Church services are rendered with loving 
and jealous care : the old reproaches are no longer 
hurled at the clergy : fat and lazy shepherds they 
certainly are not : careless and perfunctory they can- 
not now be called : even if they are less scholarly, 
which must be sorrowfully admitted, they are more 
earnest. 




^O-*!--*--* 



^^^^.^ 



CONCLUSION 259 

The revival of the Ghurch services has produced 
its effect also upon Dissent. Its ministers are more 
learned and more cultured : their congregations are no 
longer confined to the humbler trading-class: their 
leaders belong to society : their writers are among the 
best litterateurs of the day. 

That the science of warfare, by sea and land, lias 
also changed, is a doubtful advantage. Yet wars are 
short, which is, in itself, an immeasurable gain. The 
thin red Hue will be seen no more : nor the splendid 
great man-o'-war, with a hundred guns and a crew of 
a thousand men. 

The Universities, which, fifty years ago, belonged 
wholly to the Church, are now thrown open. The 
Fellowships and Scholarships of the Colleges were 
then mostly appropriated : they are now free, and the 
range of studies has been immensely widened. 

As for the advance in physical and medical science 
I am not qualified to speak. But everybody knows 
that it has been enormous : while, in surgery, the 
discovery of anassthetics has removed from life one of 
its most appalling horrors. 

In hterature, though new generations of writers 

have appeared and passed away, we have still with us 

the two great poets who, fifty years ago, had already 

begun their work. The Victorian era can boast of 

such names as Carlyle, Macaulay, Thackeray, Dickens, 

Tennyson, and Browning, in the first rank of men of 

letters; those of Darwin, Faraday, and Huxley in 
24 



26o FIFTY YEARS AGO 

science. Besides these there has been an immense 
crowd of men and women who belong to the respect- 
able second rank — to enumerate whom would take 
pages. Who can say if any of them will live beyond 
the century, and if any will be remembered in a 
hundred years ? 

We have all grown richer, much richer. 'The 
poor,' says Mr. George, ' have grown poorer.' That 
is most distinctly and emphatically untrue. Nothing 
could be more untrue. The poor — that is to say, the 
working classes — have grown distinctly better off. They 
are better housed ; they are better fed ; they are more 
cheaply fed ; they are better dressed ; they have a thou- 
sand luxuries to which they were formerly strangers ; 
their children are educated ; in most great towns 
they have free libraries ; they have their own clubs ; 
they are at liberty to combine and to hold public 
meetings ; they have the Post Office Savings Bank ; and, 
as for political power, they have all the power there is, 
because you cannot give any man more than his vote. 

Formerly they demanded the Six Points of the 
Charter, and thought that universal happiness would 
follow on their acquisition. We have now got most 
of the Six Points, and we do not care much about the 
rest. Yet happiness is not by any means universal. 
Some there are who still think that by more tinkering 
of the machinery the happiness of the people will be 
assured. Others there are who consider that political 
and social wisdom, on the possession of which by our 



CONCLUSION 261 

rulers the welfare of the people does mainly depend, is 
outside and independent of the machinery. 

Is it nothing, again, that the people have found out 
their own country ? Formerly their lives were spent 
wholly in the place where they were born ; they knew 
no other. Now the railways carry them cheaply every- 
where. In one small town of Lancashire the factory- 
hands alone spend 30,000/. a year in excursions. The 
railways, far more than the possession of a vote, had 
given the people a knowledge of their strength. 

The civil service of the country is no longer in the 
patronage of the Government. There are few spoils 
left to the victors ; there are no sinecures left ; except 
in the Crown Colonies, there are few places to be given 
away. It is, however, very instructive to remark that, 
wherever there is a place to be given away, it is inva- 
riably, just as of old, and without the least difference of 
party, whether Conservatives or Liberals are in power, 
filled up by jobbery, favouritism, and private interest. 

You have been told how they have introduced vast 
reforms in Law. Prisons for debt have been abolished ; 
yet men are still imprisoned for debt. Happily I know 
httle about the administration of Law. Some time ago, 
however, I was indirectly interested in an action in the 
High Court of Justice, the conduct and result of which 
gave me much food for reflection. It was an action 
for quite a small sum of money. Yet a year and a 
half elapsed between the commencement of the action 
and its hearing. The verdict carried costs. The costs 



262 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

amounted to three times the sum awarded to the plaintiff. 
That seems to be a delightful condition of tilings when 
you cannot get justice to listen to you for a year and 
a half, and when it may cost a defendant three times 
the amount disputed in order to defend what he knows 
— though his counsel may fail to make a jury under- 
stand the case — to be just and right. I humbly sub- 
mit, as the next reform in Law, that Justice shall have 
no holidays, so as to expedite actions, and that the 
verdict shall in no case carry costs, so as to cheapen 
them. 

As for our recreations, we no longer bawl comic 
songs at taverns, and there is no Vauxhall. On tlie 
other hand, the music-hall is certainly no improvenient 
on the tavern; the 'Colonies' was perhaps a more 
respectable Vauxhall ; the comic opera may be better 
than the old extravaganza, but I am not certain that it 
is ; there are the Crystal Palace, the Aquarium, and the 
Albert Hall also in place of Vauxhall ; and there are 
outdoor amusements unknown fifty years ago — lawn 
tennis, cycling, rowing, and athletics of all kinds. 

There has been a great upward movement of the 
professional class. New professions have come into 
existence, and the old professions are more esteemed. 
It was formerly a poor and beggarly thing to belong 
to any other than the three learned professions ; a 
barrister would not shake hands with a solicitor, a 
Nonconformist minister was not met in any society. 
Artists, writers, journahsts, were considered Bohemians. 



CONCLUSION 263 

The teacliing of anything was held in contempt; to 
become a teacher was a confession of the direst 
poverty — there were thousands of poor girls eating out 
their hearts because they had to ' go out ' as gover- 
nesses. There were no High Schools for girls ; there 
were no colleges for them. 

Slavery has gone. There are now no slaves in 
Christendom, save in the island of Cuba. Fifty years 
ago an American went mad if you threw in his teeth 
the ' Institution ; ' either he defended it with zeal, or 
else he charged England with having introduced it 
into the country : in the Southern States it was as 
much as a man's life was worth to say a word against 
it; travellers went South on purpose that they might 
see slaves put up to auction, mothers parted from their 
children, and all the stock horrors. Then they came 
home and wrote about it, and held up their hands and 
cried, 'Oh, isn't it dreadful?' The negro slavery is 
gone, and now there is only left the slavery of the 
women who work. When will that go too .? And 
how can it be swept away ? 

Public executions gone : pillory gone — the last man 
pilloried was in the year 1830 : no more flogging in the 
army : the Factory Acts passed : all these are great 
gains. A greater is the growth of sympathy with all 
those who suffer, whether wrongfully or by misfortune, 
or through their own misdoings. This growth of 
sympathy is due especially to the works of certain 
novelists belonging to the Victorian age. It is pro- 



264 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

ducing all kinds of good works — the unselfish devotion 
of men and women to work among the poor : teaching 
of every description : philanthropy which does not 
stop short with the cheque : charity which is organ- 
ised : measures for prevention : support of hospitals 
and convalescent homes : the introduction of Art and 
Music to the working classes. 

All these changes seem to be gains Have there 
been no losses? 

In the nature of things there could not fail to be 
losses. Some of the old politeness has been lost, 
though there are still men with the fine manners of our 
grandfathers : the example of the women who speak, 
who write, who belong to professions, and are, gene- 
rally, aggressive, threatens to change the manners of 
all women : they have already become more assured, 
more self-reliant, less deferent to men's opinion — the 
old deference of men to women was, of course, merely 
conventional. They no longer dread the necessity of 
working for themselves ; they plunge boldly into the 
arena prepared to meet with no consideration on the 
score of sex. If a woman writes a bad book, for 
instance, no critic hesitates to pronounce it bad be- 
cause a woman has written it. Whatever work man 
does woman tries to do. They boldly deny any in- 
feriority of intellect, though no woman has ever pro- 
duced any work which puts her anywhere near the 
highest intellectual level. They claim a complete 
equality which they have hitherto failed to prove. 



CONCLUSION 265 

Some of tliem even secretly whisper of natural 
superiority. They demand their vote. Perhaps, be- 
fore long, they will be in both Houses, and then man 
will be speedily relegated to his proper place, which 
will be that of the executive servant. Oh ! happy, 
happy time ! 

It is said that we have lost the old leisure of life. 
As for that, and the supposed drive and hurry of modern 
life, I do not believe in it. That is to say, the compe- 
tition is fierce and the struggle hard. But these are no 
new things. It is a commonplace to talk of the leisure 
and calm of the eighteenth century — it cannot be too 
often repeated that in 1837 we were still in that century 
— I declare that in all my reading about social life in 
the eighteenth century I have failed to discover that 
leisure. From Queen Anne to Queen Vi3toria I have 
searched for it, and I cannot find it. The leisure of 
the eighteenth century exists, in fact, only in the brain 
of painter and poet. Life was hard ; labour was in- 
cessant, and lasted the whole day long ; the shopmen 
lived in the shop — they even slept in it ; the mill 
people worked all day long and far into the night. 
If I look about the country, I see in town and village 
the poor man oppressed and driven by his employer : 
I see the labourer in a blind revenge setting fire to 
the ricks ; I see the factory hand destroying the ma- 
chinery ; I see everywhere discontent, poverty, privi- 
lege, patronage, and profligacy; I hear the shrieks of 
the wretches flogged at the cart tail, the screams of the 



266 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

women flogged at Bridewell. I see the white faces of 
the poor creatures brought out to be hung up in rows 
for stealing bread ; I see the fighting of the press-gang ; 
I see the soldiers and sailors flogged into sullen obedi- 
ence ; I see hatred of the Church, hatred of the govern- 
ing class, hatred of the rich, hatred of employers — 
where, with all these things, is there room for leisure? 
Leisure means peace, contentment, plenty, wealth, and 
ease. What peace, what contentment was there in 
those days? 

The decay of the great agricultural interest is a 
calamity which has been coming upon us slowly, 
though with a continually accelerated movement. 
This is the reason, I suppose, why the country regards 
it with so strange an apathy. It is not only that the 
landlords are rapidly encountering ruin, that the 
farmers are losing all their capital, and that labourers 
are daily turned out of work and driven away to the 
great towns ; the very existence of the country towns is 
threatened ; the investments which depend on rent and 
estates are threatened ; colleges and charities are losing 
their endowments ; worst of all, the rustic, the back- 
bone and support of the country, who has always 
supphed all our armies with all our soldiers, is fast 
disappearing from the land. I confess that, if some- 
thing does not happen to stay the ruin of agriculture 
in these Islands, I think the end of their greatness will 
not be far oflf. Perhaps I think and speak as a fool ; 
but it seems to me that a cheap loaf is dearly bought 



CONCLUSION 267 

if, among other blessings, it deprives the countryside 
of its village folk, strong and healthy, and the empire 
of its stalwart soldiers. As for the House of Lords and 
the English aristocracy, they cannot survive the day 
when the farms cannot even support the hands that till 
the soil, and are left untilled and uncultivated. 

There are, to make an end, two changes especially 
for which we can never be sufficiently thankful. The 
first is the decay of the old Calvinism ; that gone, the 
chief terror of life is gone too ; the chief sting of death 
is gone ; the terrible, awful question which reasoning 
man could not refrain from asking is gone too. 

The second change is the transference of the power 
to the people. All the power that there is we have 
given to the people, who are now waiting for a prophet 
to teach them how best to use it. I trust I am under 
no illusions ; Democracy has many dangers and many 
evils ; but these seem to me not so bad as those others 
which we have shaken off. One must not expect a 
Millennium ; mistakes will doubtless be committed, and 
those bad ones. Besides, a change in the machinery 
does not change the people who run that machinery. 
There will be the tyranny of the Caucus to be faced 
and trampled down ; we must endure, with all his vices 
and his demagogic arts, the professional politician whose 
existence depends on his party ; we must expect — and 
ceaselessly fight against — bribery and wholesale corrup- 
tion when a class of these professional politicians, poor, 



268 FIFTY YEARS AGO 

unscrupulous, and grasping, will be continually, by 
every evil art, by every lying statement, by every 
creeping baseness, endeavouring to climb unto power — 
such there are already among us ; we shall have to 
awaken from apathy, and keep awake, those who are 
anxious to avoid the arena of politics, yet, by educa- 
tion, position, and natural abilities, are called upon to 
lead. Yet who, even in the face of the certain dangers, 
the certain mistakes, of Democracy, shall say that great, 
terrible, and most disastrous mistakes have not been 
made by an Aristocracy ? There is always hope where 
there is freedom ; let us trust in the common-sense of 
the nation, and remain steadfast in that trust. 



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